


To Steal from a thief (Rewritten)

by Ilmare_Ilse



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010), Ocean's (Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Friendship, Gen, Heist, Humor, Season/Series 07
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-30
Updated: 2017-07-30
Packaged: 2018-12-09 01:13:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 24,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11658531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ilmare_Ilse/pseuds/Ilmare_Ilse
Summary: Danny and the Five-0 team get involved in a complicated operation when a valuable item is stolen from a wealthy casino owner. But it's not exactly a legal operation.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a rewrite of a story I started years and years ago. The tone is a bit different from the original, but I hope you like it. 
> 
> I want to thank my friend [Narkito](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Narkito), who did an amazing job as a Beta for this monster. She cheered me on and encouraged me to keep writing, and was generally awesome through the rewriting of this tale.
> 
> Still, all mistakes are mine, and mine alone (hopefully there won’t be too many!).
> 
> The art is by the awesome [Brumeier](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Brumeier), who kindly volunteered to make this lovely title image. Thank you so much! :) Here's her [art](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11659722).
> 
> This story is set somewhat in season 7, but it assumes that the boys’ recovery wasn’t as instantaneous as in the show.  
> I hope you enjoy it!

                                                        

 

 

It had taken a good couple of months, but things were finally going back to normal. Danny was slowly returning to full duty after the plane crash, still a bit sore from his surgery and the injuries he suffered. He and Steve had been released on the same day, and practically gone right back to work, much to Danny’s displeasure. If he could still feel the discomfort of the surgery, he could imagine it was much worse for Steve.

The Governor had ordered the team to stand down for a week after their first case back, and after that, things had been quiet, HPD taking most of the load in deference to the team just going back to full capacity.

Danny was just enjoying the end of a quiet day at the office; He didn’t usually take too much pleasure in the routine of filing out requisition forms, but after spending so much time cooped up in his house, with Eric and Grace waiting on him hand and foot, he felt a new appreciation for even the simplest tasks from work.

Everyone else had gone home; Lou had a thing with Renee, Chin and Kono had a family celebration and Steve had gone home after lunch. Danny however was in no hurry to go back to his place since Grace and Charlie were with Rachel for the week and there was only so many concerned looks he could take from Eric anymore. Danny was just taking his time and enjoying the peace and quiet of an empty office when a group of men came through the door.

The man walking at the front looked vaguely familiar. He moved with a purposeful tread in Danny's direction with two rather large men at his back.  Danny noticed by his clothes, gold watch and general appearance, that the man in front of him was wealthy, obscenely wealthy, most likely and the two gorillas at his back were not packing heat but they could cause a lot of trouble with or without a gun. Danny lifted his eyebrows, greeting the newcomers. "Hello gentlemen, is there anything I can help you with?" He asked with a smile.

The man at the front of the group looked at Danny from head to toe. "Mr. Malloy. I believe I'm in need of your services once again," he said seriously, with a slight accent that Danny couldn’t pinpoint.

Danny did a double take, blinking in confusion at the other man. "Malloy? I'm sorry, but it seems you have the wrong person," he said, shaking his head and looking at the two gorillas for confirmation.

The man didn't look at all concerned by Danny's answer. "You've been quite difficult to track, Mr. Malloy, much more than your brother. I must say that the policeman identity was quite a clever move, although your latest heroics have been less than inconspicuous,” he said with an annoying smirk.

Danny lifted his hands, getting tired of the game. "Seriously? It seems that we do not understand each other. Maybe I should try with smaller words, see if that way you actually understand what I’m trying to tell you!  You have the wrong person! I have no idea who this Malloy fellow is, and frankly I don't give a damn! I'd appreciate it if you could go on your way and looked for him in some other place, maybe even try HPD, and fill out a Missing Person report! I’m sure they’ll be happy to help you over there!" He snapped, his hands moving to his waist.

To Danny’s annoyance, the man didn't show any kind of reaction to the detective’s words, only lifting his hand so that one of the men at his back could hand him a folder, which he opened and started studying seemingly interested. "I was surprised to find out that you had formed a family, Mr. Malloy. You have a beautiful daughter." He lifted his eyes to study Danny's expression. "She’s very smart as well. Did you know that Grace is at the top of her class?" He said, placing on the smart table some photographs of Grace leaving her school and some documents Danny recognized as Grace's school reports. “I was also very sorry to hear of your son’s illness. I hope that he has recovered without any complications.” He said next, producing some photos of Rachel and Charlie leaving the hospital and a more recent one of Charlie playing at his school.

Danny curled his hands into fists, knowing that trying to bust all of the guy’s teeth would only get him a beating from the two gorillas. “Who the fuck are you, and what the hell do you want?" He said in an angry growl, his hand going unconsciously to his side and finding nothing, since he had left his gun in his office, thinking he would have no need to carry it around HQ.

The man lifted his hands in a placating gesture. "There is no need to get excited, Mr. Malloy. While I find it endearing that you are so determined to stay in character, I think introductions are unnecessary. As to the reason behind my visit; as I said before, I'm afraid I'm in need of your services once again. An item of great value seems to have been misplaced and I believe that the _Black Fox_ is responsible for the new location of this item. You and your friends will help me to locate this item and to return it to its original location. All the relevant information is here," he said, getting another folder from one of the big guys and placing it next to Grace and Charlie's photos on the table.

Danny had been forced to work on his patience ever since the plane crash. The weeks of recovery and being cooped up in a hospital room with Steve had forced him to take the high ground in order to allow his partner and himself a recovery without too many setbacks.  That hard-worked patience was long gone, and Danny was ready to punch the annoying smirk off this guy’s face. "What exactly makes you think that I give a rat's ass about whatever it is that you lost?"

The man's unaffected expression didn’t change at Danny’s words. "The fact that I have acquired information regarding your past, let’s say less than legal activities, and I would be morally obliged to deliver this information to the Governor of Hawaii. You may also be convinced by the fact that I'm very well informed regarding the routine of little Grace, of your ex-wife, Rachel Edwards, and of little Charles Edwards, or have you already finished the procedure to change his last name to Williams?  Such sad turn of events that you didn’t realize he was your child until he needed your bone marrow," he said in false sympathy. 

With a nod of the man’s head, he and his bodyguards started towards the door. "I will leave you with this information, Mr. Malloy. I expect you to contact your team and start working on your assignment." And with that, they turned down the hallway and disappeared from sight.

Once he made sure the men were truly gone, Danny moved towards the table and started checking the papers they left behind. He was more than shocked to find a print of criminal records of a man who could have been his twin, with a series of photographs of the same man hotwiring a car, breaking into a house, opening a safe filled with jewelry, and all sorts of illegal activities. That shock turned to anger when he found a very detailed set of pictures of Grace and Charlie, coming into and leaving school, playing at the park, of Grace hanging out with some friends, both of them riding in the car with Rachel, Charlie playing in the park and of both of them with Danny coming into Danny’s place.

Danny's blood was boiling. Whoever this son of a bitch was, he knew enough about Grace and Charlie to represent a real threat to them, and he didn't even know what the asshole wanted. Gathering the documents with trembling hands, he picked up the folder and moved back to his office.

* * *

 

Danny's mind was spinning in all directions. He had no idea who this Malloy guy was, he had no idea who the man that visited him was and he certainly had no idea what this asshole wanted him and the team to do.

He picked up his things in a hurry and left, heading for his car. He got in and started driving, not sure where he was going, but needing to move.

After driving aimlessly for a few minutes he finally decided to head home and take a look at the paperwork the guy had left. However, he felt like he needed another head to bounce ideas with, so without thinking too much, he took out his phone from his pocket and hit #2 on his speed dial.

It was only after the phone rang a couple of times that he remembered that Steve had gone home early, claiming that he would go home and relax for once. Unfortunately, his partner picked up the phone before Danny could hang up. "Danno, please don't tell me that you're still at the office." Steve drawled, stifling a yawn.

Danny winced at the sound of his friend's voice, and started to backpedal. “Hey. No. I'm just heading home. I guess I wanted to check up on you?” He asked, unconvincingly.

Danny waited for Steve’s reply, just picturing the aneurism face slowly blossoming on his partner’s face. “Check up on me, Danny? You saw me less than five hours ago.”

Danny winced, passing a hand down his face in a nervous gesture. “Well, I don’t know! I’m bored and I thought about calling you, is that such a bad thing?” He said in annoyance.

He could hear Steve sighing, from across the line. “Danno. I thought we’ve already established that you have a tone and that when I hear that tone, I can tell that something’s going on, so why don’t you save the both of us some time and just tell me what’s going on?” Steve said, sounding irritated.  “Otherwise I’ll have to ask Kono to track your ass down, and we both know she doesn’t like it when we bother her for no reason.”

Danny groaned internally, he should have known that Steve wouldn’t let this go. Fortunately he was reaching his place. “Well, there won’t be any need to track me down. I’m at my place, and I called you to talk about something, but it’s not important, so we can talk about it at the office tomorrow,” he said, while parking the car in the driveway.

Steve was silent for a minute. “I don’t know if I’ll make it to the office tomorrow. I have a PT session.”

Danny got out of the car and entered his place, looking blindly for the light switch. "Hey, don’t worry, it’s nothing important really. What do you say if I stop by your place after work tomorrow?” He finally found the light switch and turned it on. “I can bring lunch and we can ta-” Whatever Danny was going to say was forgotten as he dropped everything on his hands and took out his gun, pointing it at the man sitting on his couch. "Don’t move. Who the fuck are you, and what are you doing at my apartment." He muttered in an angry growl.

The man sitting on the couch seemed rather unaffected by the gun pointing at his face. He had salt and pepper hair and a cocky smirk that Danny hated before he even got to know the guy. He stood up with his hands held in a non-threatening position. "Detective Williams, my name is Danny Ocean and I think that we are in need of each other's assistance."


	2. Chapter 2

"Detective Williams, my name is Danny Ocean and I think that we are in need of each other's assistance."

Danny lifted his eyebrows, not lowering his gun. "I don't even know who you are, what makes you think that I need, or want your assistance?" He said in an angry growl.

Ocean was standing with his hands in the air, trying to look harmless. "Well, the fact that you recently got a visit from Terry Benedict, that he kept addressing you by a different name and that he seems to have far too much information about your family, just to start."

Danny would have laughed, but nothing about this day seemed funny. "You are not far behind on having too much information about me. You also broke into my house, which doesn’t exactly give me a trustworthy vibe." He said, looking around the room. “Speaking of family, where is Eric?” He asked in a threatening tone. Eric had been crashing at his place since Danny was out of the hospital, wanting to be around in case Danny needed something.

Ocean smirked. "I’m guessing Eric is E-Train? He left a note saying he had a date and he ‘might get lucky’ so he didn’t know if he’ll be back tonight.” He said, pointing at a small piece of paper on the coffee table.

At least that was one less thing to worry about. “You haven't explained what you’re doing here,” Danny asked in a flat tone.

“I guess your lock is not a very good one.” Ocean said dryly. “Listen, if I wanted to harm you in any way, I would have done it by now. I am unarmed, and I have useful information for you."

"What kind of information?" Danny asked, knowing that it was a very bad idea to let a suspect talk, but he wanted answers, and maybe this guy could give him some.

"Well, I would be much more comfortable if I didn't have a gun pointing at my face." Ocean said, looking pointedly at the gun on Danny's hands.

"Yes, just like I would be more comfortable if someone hadn't broken into my house! Now start talking!" Danny griped, not making any move to lower his gun.

Ocean gave him the same annoying grin again. "Alright, Mr. Benedict carries an old grudge with me and a few of my friends. Every few years he remembers this grudge and comes knocking at our doors to request our services."

Danny lifted his eyebrows. "What kind of services?"

"He needs us to collect an item that he misplaced." Ocean's expression didn't give anything away.

Danny rolled his eyes. "He wants you to steal something that was stolen from him. I've heard the name Black Fox before. I'm not as clueless as you think I am, it still doesn't explain what's that have to do with me and why he brought my family into this mess." Danny finished with an angry growl.

Ocean looked impressed with Danny's knowledge. He was trying to come up with an explanation that wouldn't make the detective in front of him arrest him on the spot when the lights suddenly went off.

Danny looked around, his gun in front of him. He jumped at the sudden sound of his door splintering and took cover behind a chair.

Dark figures with flashlights started pouring into his apartment, but a chorus of familiar voices yelling "FIVE-0! DROP YOUR WEAPONS!" made him realize that his apartment was not under attack, it was just his team overreacting. He moved away from his cover, lowering his weapon. "What the hell is the matter with you? You ever heard of knocking?" He yelled in annoyance.

Kono and Chin lowered their weapons as well, looking around the room and seeming a bit disappointed at not having the chance to shoot at anything. "Danny, you ok? We thought that someone had broken into your place and were holding you hostage!" Kono asked in concern.

Danny shook his head, turning around to address Ocean. "You see what I have to-" only Ocean was nowhere to be found. Danny whirled around, but he couldn't see much with the lights still off. "Where the hell did he go?"

Chin had already moved into the house, doing a sweep of every room with the light from his gun. When he reached the bathroom, he called out. "Danny, over here!"

Danny moved to the bathroom and looked inside, seeing that the window was wide open, posing as the perfect escape route. "Damn." He said, rubbing a hand down his face.

"Are you alright, brah? Can you tell me what happened?" Chin asked gently, putting a hand on his friend’s shoulder.

Danny rubbed his forehead tiredly, not really sure where to start. “Honestly? I have no fucking clue.” He said in annoyance. He started moving back to the living room, stumbling with his own furniture in the dark and discreetly using a hand to lean against the walls, since his knees had decided that he’d had enough excitement for the day. He could hear what sounded like Lou and Abby clearing the backyard. “So where is our fearless leader anyway? Checking the perimeter? Torturing a neighbor?”

Chin chuckled, moving with Danny towards the living room and leading him to the couch, while Kono went back outside. “Believe it or not, he’s waiting outside in Lou’s truck.” He said as he nudged Danny to sit. The lights chose that moment to come back on, and it only helped to give an extra punch to the headache that Danny had been fighting for the last hour.

Danny sat down with a groan, closing his eyes to avoid the glare from the overhead lamp. “Really? How’d you manage that?”

Chin grew serious, studying Danny. “I told him that we’d be distracted if we had to keep an eye of him.” He said seriously, which only served to make Danny feel even worse about this whole clusterfuck of a day. He turned at the sound of some loud voices coming from outside.

“Chin cleared the house and you and Abby cleared the backyard, so I’m free to go inside and check on my partner!” They could hear Steve’s annoyed voice coming closer.

“Oh, so you think you’re free to go inside because Chin gave us the all clear? Well, let me tell you right now that you’re wrong, because the all clear was meant for the four of us that are not recovering from getting shot just over a month ago!” They heard Lou grumbling from outside.

Chin waved at Danny to stay put while he moved closer to the front door. “Ladies, if you’re done arguing, maybe you can get in here and see for yourself that your partner is no worse for wear.” He said in amusement.

Steve stepped through the door followed by Lou, Abby and Kono. He looked around the living room, checking for signs of struggle and breathed a relieved sigh when he laid his eyes on Danny. “Hey buddy. You alright?” He asked gently, moving to sit on the coffee table in front of his partner.

Danny nodded tiredly, lifting his hands to rub his throbbing forehead.

Steve didn’t look too convinced. “You sure? Maybe we should get you checked out at the hospital.”

Danny lifted his eyes to glare at his partner. “Maybe you should get checked out at the hospital, by a shrink!” He grumbled, losing steam pretty quickly. “You shouldn’t have come here. You just overreacted.”

Steve’s expression turned stony. “Right, because you wouldn’t have rushed here after your call with your partner gets interrupted by someone breaking into his house!”   

Danny lifted his hands to rub his eyes tiredly. “Damn, I forgot about that,” he said with a groan. He leaned to the side, looking for the things he dropped when he was startled by Ocean in his living room. He only found his phone still there on the floor. He got up from the couch and moved to pick it up, crouching to take a look under the furniture. There was no sign of the folder that Benedict left behind with the information on that Malloy guy and the pictures and documents of Grace and Charlie. He looked around the room at his teammates, thinking that someone may have picked it up, but it was nowhere to be found.

Steve got up after Danny, seemingly concerned at his behavior. He looked at Chin for an explanation, but the other man only shrugged in confusion.

Danny looked at his teammates helplessly. “There was a folder. I think the guy took it,” he muttered quietly, dropping tiredly to sit on an armchair and dropping his head on his hands.

Chin and Steve shared a look, and Chin motioned for Kono to follow him to Danny’s room, while Steve moved back to Danny’s side. “Do you know what the guy wanted?” He asked gently.

Danny shrugged, not lifting his head from his hands. “I wish I knew,” he was too tired to make sense of the whole mess, and even if he could, he wasn’t sure what Benedict or Ocean really wanted.

Steve squeezed his friend's shoulder in comfort. “OK, and where’s Eric?”

Danny nodded to the coffee table. “He’s out on a date,” He said quietly. Abby took Eric’s note and confirmed it.

Steve stood up when Chin and Kono came back with a gym bag. "Alright, Danno. We’re going to my place and we’ll give Eric a call so he meets us there if he wants to. We’ll see what else we can find out tomorrow.”

It was a sign of how done Danny was with the day that he didn’t argue over heading to Steve’s. He wasn’t so far gone that he’d let Steve help him to the truck, but in the end he accepted Chin’s help.

He got in the back and didn’t even notice his team’s worried glances when he just leaned his head against the window and closed his eyes. Hopefully tomorrow he’ll have the energy to figure out what the hell that damn Danny Ocean wanted.


	3. Chapter 3

Danny didn’t remember too much after getting in Lou’s truck. There was some manhandling up some stairs, someone forced some pills down his throat along with some water, and maybe he changed clothes. The next thing he knew, Steve was shaking him awake, and it was clear outside. “Hey buddy. Chin is driving me to PT. I’ll be back in a couple of hours. Go back to sleep, you still look like crap.” He said quietly.

Danny just nodded in the right places and then snuggled back into the blankets, going right back to sleep.

* * *

 

The wonderful smell of bacon and eggs brought Danny back to the world of the living. He yawned and stretched in the comfortable mattress, only now realizing that he was in Steve’s guest bedroom. He rubbed his eyes with another yawn, and finally got out of bed.

He was surprised to find himself wearing track pants that were too long and a US Navy t-shirt, but stranger things had happened to him in the last 24 hours, so he just decided to go with it. The angry growls coming from his stomach made him decide to move. Picking up his phone from the nightstand he started towards the living room, expecting to find Steve and Chin sharing some kind of healthy breakfast, but found the room empty.

The first thing that Danny noticed when he looked around was the familiar folder sitting on the coffee table. He moved quickly to open it, dropping his phone on the couch and finding the now familiar photos of the man that looked so much like him. Some noise coming from the kitchen made him pick up the folder with all the papers and move there to ask his partner for some overdue explanations. "Hey, Super SEAL, why the hell didn’t you mention the fact that you had this damn fo- FUCK!"

Once he got in the kitchen, he realized that Steve had not been the one cooking breakfast. In fact, his partner and Chin were nowhere to be found.

Instead, Danny Ocean was sitting at the kitchen table having a cup of coffee while a tall blond guy was standing nearby, a plate of eggs and bacon on his hands. The blond lifted his eyes, surprised at Danny's reaction. "Morning, want some breakfast?" He said, still chewing.

Danny took a deep breath, pinching the bridge of his nose and turned to Ocean. "How the hell did you get in here?"

Ocean smiled that self-assured smile Danny had started to hate. "Your partner doesn't have a very good lock."

Danny wasn’t really amused. “He’s got a really good lock.”

Ocean and the blond guy shared a knowing smirk. “Not good enough then,” Ocean said with a shrug.

Danny studied the two men in the room. "Alright, so who’s the cook, a friendly locksmith?" He said, moving to sit on the other chair.

The blond guy smiled. "Rusty Ryan." He said, after swallowing the mouthful of eggs on his mouth.

Danny raised his eyebrows. "Rusty? Seriously?"

Rusty just smiled, taking a sip of his own coffee.

Danny rolled his eyes, turning to Ocean. "So? Start explaining,” he said without a hint of humor.

Ocean looked at Rusty again, they shared what looked like a silent conversation and then he turned his attention back to Danny. “Alright, where do you want me to start?”

“Why don’t you start by telling me about my evil twin?” Danny asked, opening the folder and showing them Turk’s photo.

Ocean’s amusement seemed to fade. He leaned forward on his seat, looking straight at Danny. "Turk Malloy is one of our associates; he has worked with us in a number of projects, some of which caused Mr. Benedict to lose a considerable amount of money."

Danny glared at his namesake. "What did you steal from him?"

"A wife! Oh! And 160 million dollars, but we gave those back a couple of years later," Rusty said in amusement.

Danny looked from one man to the other, not being able to wrap his head around how much money 160 million dollars were.

He didn't have time to ponder too long, because Ocean was continuing his story. "Yes, we returned that money, with interests, but ever since that time, and after a couple more negotiations with Mr. Benedict, he seems to come to us every time something of his goes missing," he said with a shrug.

Danny glared at him. "That still doesn't explain his visit to me."

Rusty spoke up. "Did you take a look at Turk's picture?"

Danny nodded. "Yeah, he looks a bit like me. He's a couple of years younger though."

Ocean nodded. "The resemblance is uncanny. And we may have done something to divert Benedict's attention towards you and away from Turk. All the publicity you recently got with that plane crash may have helped as well."

Danny shook his head in disbelief. "Lucky me,” he said dryly. “And where the hell is this Turk guy right now? On vacation in the Bahamas? On his honeymoon in Paris?"

Rusty and Ocean shared a pointed look again. "He's in a hospital in Chicago, under an alternative name,” Rusty said quietly. “He's been in a coma for about two months now."

Danny shook his head sadly. "What happened to him?"

Ocean shrugged. "He likes race cars. Apparently he lost control of one and ended up flipping it over a couple of times."

Danny grimaced, running his hand down his face. "I still don’t understand what you guys want with me. You don't expect me to step in and replace him in your merry band of… whatever the hell it is that you guys do?"

Ocean gave Rusty a look and then turned to Danny. "Well, that is up to you. We could use your help, and the access you have to certain information and facilities, but we kind of work at the edge of the law," he said pointedly.

Danny gave them an incredulous look. "The edge of the law, you say? I'm willing to bet that whatever it is that you gentlemen do is way off the edge of the law. In fact, I'm sure it's so far off the edge of the law, it might as well be in a different galaxy! You stole 160 million dollars and got off scot-free! That is not anywhere close to the edge of the law!"

"I was in lock up for six months for violating my parole for that one," Ocean interjected, trying to look innocent.

"Poor you," Danny said dryly. He moved to the coffee machine to pour himself a big cup. "Anyway, what is it that Benedict wants you to recover?"

Ocean and Rusty looked at each other again, having yet another one of those silent conversations that were starting to get on Danny’s nerves. Finally they seemed to come to an unspoken agreement. Ocean turned to Danny. "It's a long story.”

“I have time,” Danny retorted seriously.

Rusty shifted at his side, lifting his hand to check his watch. “Do you really? Your partner and Detective Kelly should be coming back soon.”

Danny had completely lost track of time. He looked for his phone on the kitchen table, just now remembering that he’d left in on the couch. “Wait here,” he instructed, moving quickly to the living room.

He found his phone squished between the sofa cushions and turned on the screen to find five missed calls and a couple of increasingly concerned texts from Steve.

He moved back to the kitchen, addressing the two men. “Get away from the windows and try to look as harmless as possible," he ordered in a no nonsense tone, while he moved to the windows to see if he could spot Steve or Chin doing anything crazy.

When he didn’t see any movement, he moved towards the living room, jumping a bit when the front door opened silently and two figures came through the door.

The sight of Steve and Chin wearing full tactical gear (grenades included) and huge rifles was the last straw for Danny. 

"Steven. Grenades? Seriously?" He said in a deadly calm voice.

Steve stood up straight, giving Chin a nervous look, while Chin just shook his head in a long suffering way and moved to take off his vest and sit on the couch.  "It's just a couple of flash bangs, Danno.”

Danny moved back to the kitchen, needing some space. He was trying really hard to keep some semblance of control. The sight of both Ryan and Ocean trying to sneak off through the back door shattered what little was left of it. "Where the fuck do you two think you're going? Sit your asses down, or I swear to God I'll shoot you in the kneecaps!" Ocean and Ryan looked at each other and moved quickly back to their chairs.

Steve and Chin left the tac-gear in the living room and followed Danny into the kitchen, standing quietly on the side, not wanting to upset Danny any more than he already was.

Danny found a chair and sat down. He looked up at the two men sitting across from him, grinding his teeth when he saw them grinning. "What now?" He said in an angry growl.

Every trace of humor vanished from their faces. "Nothing, it's just that you look a lot like Turk, but you're much, much scarier. It's amusing, actually, up until the time when we start fearing for our own safety, of course," Ryan said, hoping not to get Danny even madder.

Danny ran a hand down his face, pinching the bridge of his nose. He noticed the two other men standing behind him. “Steven, Chin Ho, these are Danny Ocean and Rusty Ryan. Please, take a seat so that they can finally tell us what the hell is it that they want to steal and who they want to steal it from. Then we can decide whether to arrest them, help them or shoot them, in which case you two will be in charge of disposing of the bodies."


	4. Chapter 4

Once everyone was sitting or staying put, Danny attempted to explain what was going on, or at least what he knew. “OK, so last night, after Lou and Chin went home, I had a visit from this rich looking guy with two walls of muscle at his back,” he started.

Steve nodded. “Terry Benedict, he’s the owner of a number of casinos in Vegas and Mississippi,” he said, looking at Chin for confirmation.

Chin nodded. “Kono and Lou did some digging this morning, they caught Benedict’s visit on the security footage and did a background check on him. We found some interesting money transfers to a couple of unsavory people here on the island, unfortunately nothing that can be directly traced to him. We’ve tracked a couple of guys that we think have worked for him before, and Abby and Kono are on the way to pay them a visit,” he said at Danny’s surprised expression.

“The only missing link is these gentlemen, who seem very eager to talk to you,” Steve continued, giving Ocean and Rusty a threatening look.

Rusty looked at Ocean, and at his nod he started talking. "Well, Terry Benedict doesn't exactly have money issues, he has a considerable collection of valuable objects, some acquired through the regular channels, auction houses and the like, and a number of objects that were acquired through less traditional channels."

Danny lifted his eyebrows. "Such as?"

Rusty shrugged. "He's been known to commission certain objects; most of these objects are his trophies. Pieces that represent his superiority over old adversaries."

Danny sighed. "Is there a point to this long winded story on Benedict's hoarder tendencies?"

Rusty ignored Danny’s interruption. "Two months ago, one of his trophies was stolen. Some of his sources informed him that the person that stole it might have stashed it here in Hawaii. Unfortunately, they also brought his attention to the Governor's task force, more specifically to the last of the group of people that had assisted him in previous occasions, or at least to a man who looked a lot like him; a detective that made the news recently after landing a plane in the middle of Waikiki beach."

Danny dropped his head tiredly, and heard Steve shifting at his side, feeling a warm hand squeezing his shoulder.

Steve divided his attention between his partner and the two men across the room "What is it that was stolen from him, and why would they bring it to Hawaii?" Steve could see that Danny had had enough mystery for the day, so he wanted the story to keep moving along.

Ocean smirked. "There is no better place to hide something than in plain sight."

Danny frowned, sharing a confused look with Steve. “And how would he do that?” Danny asked, starting to really lose his patience.

“Well, that’s information that I am not comfortable sharing, unless you are willing to take part in the operation,” Ocean said, turning serious.

At Ocean’s answer, Danny jumped to his feet and only Steve’s hand on his shoulder stopped him from doing some physical damage to the other man. "At which point in our short acquaintance did you get the impression that we like people who beat around the bush? Huh?"

Chin moved to Danny’s other side, putting a calming hand on Danny’s free shoulder and directed him back to his chair.  He gave Ocean and Rusty a serious look. “Gentlemen, I think it’s in your best interests to come clean about what’s going on. You’ve already given us enough reason to detain you and start looking into your lives, and our team is the best, so you may not like what we find.”

Ocean and Rusty shared a look, and while Rusty shrugged, Ocean rolled his eyes and nodded in agreement. “Alright, as I said, Benedict likes to collect rare items. A few years ago he got his hands on a rare necklace. This necklace has a surprising likeness to one of Queen Liliʻuokalani's diamond necklaces.”

Chin and Steve shared a surprised look. “Those jewels were stolen more than one hundred years ago,” Chin stated.

Steve nodded in agreement. “They were never found, and there are a number of theories about what happened to them. Some stories say that the ship they used to transport them out of the island was shipwrecked. There is no way that Benedict has the real thing.”

Ocean nodded in agreement. “Well, if what you say is true, then Benedict paid 50 million dollars for a fake necklace,” he said with a shrug.

Chin and Steve looked at each other and then turned to Danny, wanting his input. Danny just crossed his arms over his chest. “What? I always thought that the king and queen of Hawaii walked around in those grass skirts and coconut bras. I had no idea they had actual jewelry!” He said with a self-conscious shrug. He didn’t want to admit that he thought that the whole King and Queen of Hawaii was some sort of fairy tale either.

Kono, Abby and Lou joined them a couple of hours later, after finding that all of the leads they had related to Benedict had suddenly decided to leave the island.

The only line of investigation they had left was trying to track down two men that once had a run in with Benedict and that coincidentally found themselves visiting the islands right then. What Kono, Lou and Abby never expected was to find Robert Ryan and Daniel Ocean sitting on Steve’s living room and sharing the details of their next heist with half of the Governor’s Task Force.

* * *

Meanwhile, Danny had learned that the queen of Hawaii was more than just some sort of legend, that she had possessed very valuable jewelry, that not all of her jewelry was accounted for, and that one of the most valuable pieces was thought to be definitely lost. This piece in particular was not in fact lost; it was lost to the State of Hawaii, but there was a Casino owner that had had it in his possession for the last five years, and an international thief that knew its current exact location perfectly.

Ocean and Ryan spent far too long explaining to the team how they had allegedly stolen the 160 million that got them in the doghouse with Benedict, how they had managed to get on the Black Fox AKA François Toulour’s bad graces, and how Toulour had supposedly stolen the necklace from Benedict. According to Ocean’s intel, Toulour was supposedly keeping the necklace in a ranch in Lanai and they needed to come up with a plan to get back that necklace and avoid any punishment Benedict wanted to deal out.

There was only one tiny detail, Benedict wanted Danny to take part in the operation.

After the long explanation was over, Danny just stared at them for a minute, trying to figure out if this was some kind of a joke or if he really was in front of a couple of guys that could make Steve's antics seem like a peaceful stroll down the park.

* * *

 

After Danny had processed what these guys were capable of doing, what they wanted him to do, and had some level of certainty they were not actors playing some sort of practical joke, he stood up abruptly and moved towards the lanai. "Guys, a word please?" He said to his team, but not before growling a "Don't go anywhere" in the general direction of the two other men in the room.

Danny moved to one of the chairs on the lanai and sat down tiredly, waiting for his team to join him. Once everyone was settled, Danny started talking. "Listen guys. I'm going to need to take some time off for this," he said, not looking at the others.

Chin and Kono shared an amused look while Lou and Abby just sat back to wait until the argument was over. Steve for his part looked at his partner in surprise. "Excuse me?"

Danny turned to his partner, but still wouldn't look straight at him. "I said I need to take some time off for this! What part of that is unclear for you, huh?"

Steve glared at him. "The part where it sounds like you're thinking on doing this thing alone!" Steve snapped.

Danny finally lifted his eyes to glare at his partner. "Well, yes! Of course I have to do this alone!" Danny yelled.

Before Steve could react, Chin moved to stand between the other two men. “Alright, hold on a second, Ladies,” he said, addressing the pair. Turning to Danny he gave him a serious look. “First of all, what gives you the idea that we would let you deal with all of this on your own?”

Danny gave him an incredulous look. “The fact that what they want to do is highly illegal, the fact that Benedict is threatening MY family and the part where I’m the one that looks exactly like one of the members of the band of international thieves!” He said in annoyance.

Chin smiled in amusement. “Well, I was just thinking that you looked kind of familiar. It may be a coincidence, but you also happen to look a lot like a guy that’s part of our Ohana,” Chin said with a smile, looking around and getting agreeing nods from the rest of the team.

Danny shook his head, standing up to face Chin. “I can’t ask you guys to help with this, there is no way you can get involved in a plot to steal long lost Hawaiian jewels!”

Kono chuckled and moved to stand at Danny’s side. “You’re right, brah. We definitely can’t be involved in stealing those jewels,” she deadpanned.

Lou chuckled. “It would be _‘highly illegal,’_ ” he said with a grin.

Steve smiled a self-satisfied smile. “So that’s settled, then. We are not stealing the jewels.”

A few minutes later, the whole team moved back to Steve’s living room, pleasantly surprised to find Rusty and Ocean still in the room.

Danny took a seat in front of them, taking a deep breath before he revealed their decision. “OK. We are in. But that means all of us. They won’t let me do this thing alone, and if I say no, then they’re just going to burst in and make a mess of everything.”

Ocean and Ryan looked at each other; they went through a minute long silent conversation and finally looked back at Danny. "Welcome to the team!" Ocean said, a fake smile on his face.


	5. Chapter 5

To say that the first meeting between 5-0 and Ocean’s crew was strange would be an understatement. Danny wasn’t surprised at the fancy neighborhood or the actual butler that led them to the lanai where the meeting was taking place. He was a bit surprised at the number of people that formed Ocean’s team though, and how most of them didn’t really look like world-class thieves.

Ryan came closer to greet them with some fruity drink in hand “Hey! Glad you could make it! Come on, let me introduce you to everyone,” he said as he motioned for them to follow.

He then proceeded to introduce them to Ocean’s people. “These are Linus, Basher, Yen, Livingston, Frank, Virgil, Roman, Saul, and our host, Reuben,” he said, indicating each of the men.

Most of the introductions went fine. Or as fine as they could go when you tried to remember the names of nine random guys, one of them Chinese, and a couple that really didn’t look like they wanted to be remembered. Then there was Virgil Malloy, who looked like he wanted to be anywhere but at this meeting. When Danny came closer and extended his hand, Virgil stood in place, not moving his arms from their position crossed across his chest, he looked Danny up and down and with a roll of his eyes stepped away, saying over his shoulder, “You look nothing like him. I don’t know whose bright idea this was, but you don’t belong here.”

Danny was going to follow the guy and give him a piece of his mind, but one of his teammates stopped him. “Don’t mind him, he’s just worried about his brother, don’t take it personally, please.” The guy, Linus, if his memory was correct, said as he motioned for them to join Ocean.

* * *

 

Once Ocean had everyone’s attention he started explaining the details of their target. He had multiple images of the necklace, a timeline of where it had been ever since it had been lost and some guesses about how both Benedict and Toulour had acquired it. They had blueprints of Toulour’s ranch in Lanai, a list of employees and some idea of where he could be storing the necklace. They knew the schedules for the employees, for the delivery of food and other supplies and possible weak points in the ranch’s security.

Danny was, as usual, the first to lose patience and speak up. “Alright, so we have the intel, we have the location, now we need to know what’s the plan.”

Ocean smirked. “Well, Detective Williams, to be honest, _we_ don’t have any plans to steal Queen Liliʻuokalani's necklace.”

Danny frowned, looking at Steve in confusion. “You don’t have any plans? What the hell does that mean? What is the point of this whole charade then, if you have no plans to steal the necklace?!”

Steve leaned closer to his partner and started talking in hushed tones. “I think he means that we are the ones who will be stealing the necklace, Danno.”

Danny looked from Steve’s face to Ocean’s, seeing that Steve’s guess was correct. He looked at his teammates, trying to read their reaction to the latest development and found that everyone seemed on board, some a bit more enthusiastically than others. He passed a tired hand down his face, turning to look back at Ocean. “Alright, what’s the plan then?”

* * *

 

After the meeting was over, the Five-0 team drove back to Steve’s. They needed some time to process exactly what they would need to do, and the risks they would have to take in order to do it.

“Alright, listen. We don’t have to do everything exactly as they said, Okay? You guys can stay out of this mess, and I will contact them so we can do something else,” Danny was trying to give them an out, knowing that if they got caught they could very well go to jail for this one.

Kono was the first one to talk. “Come on, brah. We already had this conversation! We are Ohana, and we stick together!” She said fervently.  “Besides, did you take a look at those guys? You’re not really thinking about depriving me of the pleasure of working with them, are you?”

Lou shook his head in amusement. “Well, I don’t know about the look of those guys, or anything like that. But I’ve watched a Disney movie or two, so I know everything about that Ohana stuff. You’re not getting rid of us that easy.” He said with an apologetic shrug.

Danny shook his head in annoyance, finally relenting. “Well, for the record, you’re all crazy, so don’t come crying to me when we all end up in jail.”

* * *

 

The next couple of weeks were filled with meetings with Ocean’s crew, reviewing the plans, and dealing with Five-0’s usual caseload.

Thankfully, after coming back from England, they had some days off that they could use to work with Ocean’s team.

Jerry and Kono spent a few days working on some intel with Livingston and Roman, or at least Kono and Jerry were trying to work while Roman gave Kono sleazy looks and Livingston stammered and was generally a nervous wreck, trying to stop them from touching the wrong button.

Steve was supposed to take a few days off after the chess-piece killer case, but he managed to make some time to hang out with Ocean, Basher and oddly enough, Yen. The two of them seemed to have the most entertaining conversations in fluent Chinese, and Danny had been unlucky enough to be present for one of those and not been able to catch a single word of what they were speaking.

Chin and Abby got together with Ryan and Saul and apparently went through some blueprints, while Lou met with Frank at Reuben’s house, and by the look of it did nothing more than smoking cigars and drinking scotch.

* * *

 

Danny had gotten what was in his opinion the short straw. He got surveillance duty, which was something he was used to doing, but he got surveillance duty with Linus, which was not so bad most times, or with Virgil, which was painfully uncomfortable.

Linus was a nice enough guy. He was a big city boy, so he didn’t mind stopping for some food, had good opinions on sports and had entertaining stories for those times when the wait turned tedious, all alleged stories that a friend of a friend heard from someone else, of course.

Virgil was a whole different story. Most times he looked like he’d swallowed a bug, sitting quietly and not engaging Danny in any way. Then there were the times when he decided he knew how to do a stakeout, and that everything Danny did was wrong.

The second day that him and Danny were on surveillance duty, they had been arguing for a good couple of hours about the spot where Danny had parked the Camaro. 

“We can’t see anything from here! We’ll miss everyone that comes in and out of the building!” Virgil argued for like the 100th time in the last hour.

Danny was really trying to stay calm. He knew the guy hadn’t really liked him from the start, and he understood that he was put in a really crappy situation, but there was only so much he could take. “We are not missing anything, we have a view of the door, and everyone that gets out through the service door has to walk around that corner, so we are in a perfectly fine spot without having everyone that comes and goes seeing us as they pass by! Not to mention, this is my car, and I get to decide where we are parking it!” Danny snapped, finally fed up with Virgil’s constant complaints.

The car was blissfully silent for all of ten minutes and then. “You’re stupid,” Virgil muttered under his breath.

Danny looked at the other man in surprise. “What are you, ten?”

It was clearly the wrong thing to say, because Virgil’s expression fell, he looked away and closed off entirely.

Danny sighed tiredly and moved to open the door. “You know what, I need some air. I’m going to get some coffee,” he said as he moved out of the car, only stopping himself from banging the door because it would be childish.

Danny got two coffees and a couple of malasadas, intending them as some sort of peace offering for Virgil. That sentiment died down pretty quickly once he rounded the corner and saw the Camaro parked in a different spot from where he’d left it.

He moved to the car, leaning to look through the driver’s window at Virgil, who was sitting in the passenger door with a self-satisfied expression. “I didn’t leave the keys in the ignition,” He asked in a dangerous tone.

“Strange,” Virgil said with a look of fake surprise on his face.

Danny just got into the car, shoved the coffee and sweets towards Virgil and sat down to drink his own. The ignition didn’t have a scratch, and the spot Virgil had picked was actually Okay, but he was not in the mood to comment on any of those things right then. The rest of the afternoon was spent in silence, much like the other stake outs they had inside a very silent car.

* * *

 

A couple of days later, Danny got a text that really got things in motion. It was from a blocked number and it read: “The Fox made his move.”


	6. Chapter 6

The lead curator from the Bishop Museum had been called for an urgent meeting. Ailani Tupuola got into the conference room to find the president of the board of directors, Raymond Granger, and a strange man with a jewelry case.

Mr. Granger stood up, coming close to Ailani. “Ms. Tupuola, let me introduce you to Monsieur Andre Ciment,” he said, looking far too excited for one of the Museum’s regular meetings.  “Monsieur Ciment has brought an amazing find, which we hope can be authenticated,” he said, motioning for the other man to speak.

Mr. Ciment cleared his throat, looking nervous. “Well, _Madmoiselle Tupuol_ , is it? I recently acquired a beautiful piece of jewelry. You _zee_ , I’m a collector, and sometimes there are some pieces whose origin I’m unfamiliar with.”

“It has recently been brought to my _attençion_ that this beautiful piece of jewelry that I purchased was in reality a piece of jewelry from the Hawaiian _Royauté_ , and not just any piece of jewelry, but Queen _Li-li-uo-kalani's_ diamond necklace,” he said, stumbling over the name. He opened the jewel case and showed them a beautiful diamond necklace bearing an impressive resemblance to the style of Queen Liliʻuokalani's jewelry.

Ailani leaned forward to look at the necklace. She turned to her briefcase to take some gloves and a magnifier. “If I may,” she asked Mr. Ciment, requesting permission to touch the beautiful piece of jewelry.

At Mr. Ciment’s nod, she carefully picked up the necklace, looking at it closely with the magnifying glass. She studied it for a few minutes and then carefully put it back in its box. “Of course that we would need to run more tests, but this piece looks like it could be from the early 1900s,” she said, not wanting to get too excited before she had more information.

Granger, on the other hand, looked like he had ants in his pants. “Monsieur Ciment, if it is at all possible, we would like to perform the necessary tests to authenticate the piece.”

Ciment seemed thoughtful for a minute. “What kind of tests would there be? I wouldn’t want such a piece damaged-” he started, but before he could continue, Granger rushed to explain.

“Oh no, Monsieur Ciment! Our first priority is to protect the integrity of the piece, we would never do anything to damage it!” He said, putting his hands together as if he was pleading to Ciment to give up the necklace.

Ciment looked indecisive, but finally with a nod of his head, he agreed. “Very well. You can make your tests. I just want to know for sure. I wouldn’t want to have in my possession an item so precious for the people of Hawaii,” he said with an uncertain nod. ”How long do you think you will need the piece? And when can I expect the results?” He asked, extending the jewelry case towards Ailani.

Ailani took the case. “It shouldn’t take more than 2 or 3 weeks, maybe a month. We will keep you posted of any news as soon as we have them.”

After the usual pleasantries, Ciment and Granger left, leaving her alone with the necklace. She sat down and opened the box again, needing to see for herself that she wasn’t dreaming. “Oh… my… freaking… god…” She said, before she got herself together, closed the case and moved towards her work station. She had a lot of work to do.

* * *

 

The text Danny got was followed by instructions to meet at Reuben’s place that evening. Since Danny had his children that night, he had to pick them up from Rachel’s and drop them off with Renee before he could get to the meeting.

When he got there, he was surprised to find a much smaller crowd than usual. Rusty opened the door himself, cleaning his mouth with a napkin. He invited him in and showed him to a smaller dining room where Ocean, Reuben, Saul and Basher were having dinner with Kono, Steve, Lou and Chin. Danny took a vacant chair and helped himself to one of the sandwiches from a tray. “Alright, what did I miss?” He asked while he chewed.

Rusty was just swallowing his own food. “Well, Toulour set up a meeting with the President of the Bishop Museum. It looks like he left them a necklace to authenticate.”

Danny stopped chewing, looking around the table in surprise. “Is it the real necklace?”

There was silence around the table, until Chin finally spoke. “We’ll know soon enough.”

“ _It shouldn’t take more than 2 or 3 weeks, maybe a month_ ,” Kono said with a smirk.

Reuben cleared his throat, taking out a couple of cigars and passing one to Lou. “Enough business talk already! We’ll worry about the thing when we have to. Right now we are enjoying a meal that Mrs. Grover kindly provided and we are taking a moment to relax,” he said, as he put the cigar on his mouth. He was kind enough not to light it while there was people still eating, but the subject of the necklace was dropped for the moment.

Danny continued to eat, but finally curiosity got the better of him. “So, what did you do with the children?”

Kono coughed to cover a laugh, and Steve just shook his head in amusement. Ocean smirked, giving Basher a look. “Well, the young ones went off on an adventure!” The black man declared in his thick cockney accent.

Danny shook his head deciding to focus on his food. It was probably for the best that he didn’t know.

* * *

 

About a month later, Ailani and Mr. Granger were having another meeting with Andre Ciment. Sadly, the news they had to give weren’t as good as they hoped for.

“Monsieur Ciment,” Granger started, “it took us some time to have a definitive answer, but according to the tests we have performed, the piece you brought to us is a beautifully made replica of Queen Liliʻuokalani's diamond necklace. I’m afraid the piece is not the original,” he said, motioning for Ailani to continue.

Ailani cleared her throat. “We performed a number of tests on the crystals and the metal components, and while the crystals are in fact diamonds and we estimate they are from the correct timeframe, the work on the metal doesn’t match the technique used by the queen’s master jeweler,” she explained, “in fact, there is a specific signature from the jeweler that is missing in this piece,” she continued, displaying some photographs of small details in a number of pieces of jewelry.

Ciment lowered his glasses to look closely at the photographs. “So it’s not the real necklace?” He asked, sounding a bit disappointed.

Ailani shook her head. “I’m afraid it isn’t, but it is a beautiful replica.”

Mr. Granger cleared his throat. “Monsieur Ciment, I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but some of Queen Liliʻuokalani's jewels have been missing for more than a century. It’s because of this that it would mean a great deal for the people of Hawaii if you would let us display this piece in our museum,” he asked, almost squirming in excitement.

Ciment frowned in confusion. “But, you said it was not authentic.”

Mr. Granger nodded. “Yes, but it has an amazing likeness to the original piece! We would not presume to have the original, we would just use it for educational purposes, and only for a short time!”

Mr. Ciment nodded in understanding. “Very well. You can exhibit the necklace. Although, I would request that my name is not used for any of the publicity of the exhibit. I’m a very private person.”

Mr Granger nodded again, lifting his hand to shake Ciment’s. “Absolutely.”

* * *

 

As far as Five-0 was concerned, since the museum had a replica of the necklace, they weren’t expected to do anything with Ocean’s crew for the time being. They were still doing some surveillance, and Ocean’s crew was building something in one of the Garages in Reuben’s place. In any case, Five-0 had a really busy couple of weeks, Danny had needed to fly to Jersey because of a family emergency and there was also the small matter of the rest of the team traveling to Morocco to rescue Doris and Wo-Fat’s father from a secret CIA location.

By the time everyone was back in Hawaii and Danny had yelled at Steve for trying to go off after Doris alone, they received an urgent call from the Governor, she needed the team to work on an urgent case.

While the Team was away, someone broke into the Bishop Museum and stole the replica of Queen Liliʻuokalani's necklace.


	7. Chapter 7

After the talk with the Governor, Chin and Lou went straight to the Museum to interview the people in charge of the exhibit.

They were meeting the president of the board of directors, one Raymond Granger.

“Mr. Granger, I’m detective Chin Ho Kelly, this is Captain Lou Grover, Five-0. What can you tell us about the necklace that was stolen?”

Granger was wringing his hands in distress, looking as if his job was at stake. “Oh my. This is such an unfortunate occurrence! Here at the Bishop Museum we take great pride in the care and safety of the pieces we have in exhibition. It’s been years since any incident of this sort has happened, and how unfortunate that it happened with such a piece!”

“How long have you had the piece?” Asked Lou.

“It’s been with us for about 7 weeks. The owner of the piece, Monsieur Andre Ciment brought it to get authenticated. It is an amazing piece, even if it’s not the original and Monsieur Ciment agreed to loan the piece to the museum for a short exhibition. I just can’t believe that this happened!” Granger replied.

“And what can you tell us about Andre Ciment?” Chin asked.

“Oh, he’s a collector. I believe he purchased the piece a few months ago, had it restored and found out that it had an amazing likeness to the Queen’s jewel.”

Chin nodded at Granger’s reply. “Do you know if there’s any way we can contact Mr. Ciment?”

Granger produced some documents. “He has a ranch in Lanai, I could give you his contact information.”

Lou nodded, taking the papers with a smile. “We would appreciate that.”

* * *

 

Danny rang the doorbell repeatedly and even started knocking when it took them too long to open the door. When Dominic, the butler, opened the door hurriedly, Danny burst in, not having any patience left for pleasantries.

“Alright, where are they?” He asked, moving quickly to the living room and from there to the backyard.

He didn’t find anyone anywhere, and Dominic was mostly following him around, not giving any information regarding the whereabouts of Ocean’s crew.

Danny continued his search, finally remembering that they had been building something in the garage. He burst through the door, ready to lay it on anyone that crossed his path first, but the sight that met him when he entered the garage left him momentarily speechless. “What the hell is this?” He muttered once he got his voice back.

Ocean came closer, looking like he was expecting Danny. “Hey, you’re just in time to start the trial runs.”

Danny shook his head. “Trial runs? What the hell are you talking about?” Danny yelled, throwing his hands in the air and finally remembering why he was here in the first place. “You stole the stupid necklace from the museum! That wasn’t part of the plan, why the hell did you do that?”

Rusty came closer, slurping on what looked like some sort of Frappuccino drink. “Hey, calm down. We didn’t steal the original necklace, we just needed some excuse to get into Toulour’s place, didn’t we?”

Danny didn’t bother to reply, he was fuming.

“Ok, let me ask you something. Where are McGarrett and lovely Ms. Kalakaua then?” Rusty asked, with a smug smile on his face.

Danny just shook his head in disbelief, still too pissed to agree with Rusty’s reasoning.

Rusty grinned, reaching to pat Danny’s back and lead him towards the structure in the middle of the room. “Come on, let me show you this thing so we can start the trial runs. Also, Linus’ father came to visit. You can meet him too.”

* * *

 

Steve and Kono flew to Lanai that morning, renting a truck at the airport and drove into Andre Ciment’s large property, taking note of the difficulties that trying to get there unnoticed would imply. The place was well guarded, had top surveillance equipment, from what little they could see and seemed to have tall fences all around, that managed not to ruin the beautiful views, but worked at keeping intruders away.

Once they parked, they got out of the rental truck and were greeted by a maid.

“Aloha, Mr. Ciment is waiting for you. Please follow me,” she said with a smile.

Kono smiled at the greeting and both her and Steve followed her into the large house, walking down a huge living room and out to the lanai. There was a large pool in the backyard, surrounded by beach chairs and a couple of beach umbrellas. They met Andre Ciment on one of the chairs, enjoying the sun.

“ _Mercy_ , Kala,” he said, dismissing the maid and turning his attention to the newcomers. “I understand you are the investigators for the robbery of my necklace?”

Steve nodded, moving forward to shake Ciment’s hand.

“Mr. Ciment, I’m Lt. Commander Steve McGarrett and this is Officer Kono Kalakaua, Five-0. We wanted to ask you a few questions if it’s okay with you?”

Ciment nodded moving back to the Lanai. “Yes, of course. Please have a seat.”

Steve and Kono settled on the lanai and waited for Ciment to sit.

“Mr. Ciment, we understand that you purchased the necklace from an auction house?” Steve asked.

“Yes, that is correct. I acquired the necklace a few months ago from an auctioneer in Amsterdam. I love these kind of pieces, so I have a… a _restauratrice_? I mean, someone that restores works of art. He’s the one that informed me of the resemblance of the piece to that of the queen’s _collier-pardon_ , the necklace.” Ciment replied, looking a bit confused. “But I don’t understand why this is relevant. The piece wasn’t stolen from my property. It was stolen from the museum.”

Kono cleared her throat. “Mr. Ciment, it would be important to know where the piece came from, maybe even try to track the person that made the replica. We are trying to determine if the thieves were after the queen’s necklace or if they knew it was a replica and were looking to sell each diamond by itself.”

Ciment nodded in understanding. “Very well, I will provide you with the information of the auctioneer and my _restauratrice_ , just give me a few minutes,” he said as he moved inside the house. Kono made faces at Steve so he would follow, but Steve didn’t think Ciment wanted him to, and he didn’t want to cause a bad impression so early.

Ciment came back with some documents that he handed to Steve. ”I have to ask, is this the only line of investigation you have?”

“No, of course not,” replied Steve. “Two of our colleagues are at the museum, checking the surveillance footage and gathering any piece of evidence they can get their hands on. Another one of our colleagues is doing a background check on every person involved in the handling of the necklace, ever since it was put in the care of the museum.”

Ciment didn’t look too convinced. “And how long do you think it will take you before you have any reliable information about the necklace?”

Steve and Kono looked at each other and then back at Mr. Ciment. “We can’t tell you how long it will take to find your necklace, but I promise that all our resources have been assigned to this case. We will make sure that whoever stole that necklace gets what they deserve,” Steve said seriously. “Now, we have asked the museum for an appraisal for the necklace, but we would like to know how much you paid for it?”

Ciment seemed a bit hesitant to provide that information, but finally answered. “I paid 250,000 euros, plus taxes,” he said, looking a bit uncomfortable.

Steve nodded, moving to stand up. “Very well. We appreciate your cooperation. Would it be okay if we came back in case we had other questions?”

Ciment nodded. “I suppose. You are free to ask more questions if you need to,” he said, addressing Steve, he turned to take Kono’s hand and leaned to kiss it. “ _Madmoiselle Kal-kau-a_ is free to grace us with her presence any time she needs to.”

Kono blushed a bit and smiled in spite of herself. “Thank you, Mr. Ciment. We will keep you updated about our investigation.”

They said their goodbyes and left the house, moving to the car. Once they were driving out, Kono shook her head with a put upon sigh. “Well, that was a huge waste of time,” She said, taking out her phone. She dialed a number and put it on speaker.

“Hey Ocean. You’re on speaker. I’m here with Steve, and we didn’t get much out of the meeting with Toulour. He’s not happy, and I’d bet he suspects we have something to do with it,” Kono said when Ocean picked up the call.

“Don’t worry about it, he knows who you are, and I’m sure he noticed you, officer Kalakaua. Just give us a couple of days and we’ll take care of the rest,” Ocean said, sounding far too confident for their liking.

* * *

 

The next couple of days were mostly uneventful. Five-0 was still investigating the robbery of the necklace, but so far they didn’t have any solid leads. Danny was still splitting his time between Five-0 and working with Ocean’s crew, finally getting a chance to work on the actual robbery, but things weren’t ready to go on with the next stage of the plan yet.

Since things were pretty quiet, Steve decided to take a day off and invited everyone to a poker night at his place. Everyone except for Ocean’s people, they didn’t want to lose all their money before they even started.

Danny didn’t get to go in the end, since he had been volunteered as a chaperone for Grace’s school dance, but he was kind enough to bring a tray of sandwiches for the guys.

It was supposed to be a fun night with friends, but in the end it was a little more exciting than anyone expected.


	8. Chapter 8

Poker night at Steve’s was interrupted by a hostage situation. It would seem like a usual occurrence for Five-0, except for the fact that the hostage situation was at Grace and Will’s dance, and Danny was stuck in the middle of it.

It took some time before Lou alerted the team of what was going on and even more time before Danny could clue them in that Will could give them some intel to what was going on inside the room, but finally the situation was diffused, and Will and Grace got the chance to have their private dance and share a milkshake. After that, everyone was ready to call it a night, so Lou drove Grace to Rachel’s and Danny back to his place.

Danny was exhausted after the tense night, but every time he closed his eyes he kept seeing the guys threatening Grace or even worse scenarios playing inside his head, so sleeping was not an option for a good couple of hours. He settled on his couch to watch something with a six-pack of beers and eventually nodded off.

The loud sound of knocking made him startle awake, reaching for a gun that wasn’t there. Danny stumbled to his feet, grumbling about annoying people coming over at stupid hours on a Sunday as he moved to the door. He was expecting anyone from his Ohana, and even Kamekona visiting wouldn't have been surprising, but the sight of Virgil Malloy standing awkwardly at his doorway wasn’t something he was expecting.

"Hey. Sorry, I didn't think you'd still be sleeping... we can talk later," Virgil said uncertainly, stepping away from the door.

Danny shook his head, motioning for Virgil to come inside as he stifled a yawn. "No, you're already here, come in. How'd you know where I live anyway?"

Virgil shrugged, stepping into the house and looking around, appearing uncomfortable with the whole situation. "Ehh, Danny knows where you live. I asked him," he mumbled with a shrug.

Danny raised his eyebrows, inwardly shaking his head. Talking to this guy was still like pulling teeth, even if Virgil was the one that had come to Danny's. "Alright, sit down. You want some coffee? Something to eat?" He asked as he moved to the kitchen in search of some breakfast and an aspirin.

Virgil didn't sit, he followed Danny into the kitchen and watched as he poured a mug of coffee. At Danny's expectant look he nodded and accepted the filled mug. "Thanks," he said quietly.

Danny filled another mug for himself and let Virgil drink the coffee in peace, but after a few minutes he needed an explanation. "Alright, so Ocean gave you my address. You wanna tell me about the reason for your visit?"

Virgil tensed a bit, but finally looked at Danny. "Linus said that you ran into some trouble last night. I was worried, so I came to see if you were alright," he said quietly.

Danny was surprised. He had assumed that Virgil hated his guts, so the concern was unexpected. "I'm good," he said with a shrug. "It's nothing that doesn't happen on a regular work day."

Virgil frowned, not looking convinced. "You were not working last night, and your kid was there."

Danny didn't need the reminder. "Well, it all turned out well, so..." he said with a practiced shrug. He didn't want to keep dwelling on the events of the previous night, so he left his mug in the kitchen sink and motioned for Virgil to follow. "Alright, why don't we head to Reuben's so we can go through this thing one more time?"

Virgil followed, but he didn't look convinced. "You sure? You look like crap," he said bluntly.

"Well, I guess you'll be the prettiest today then," Danny replied, taking his keys and moving to the door. "Come on, did you drive here?"

Virgil followed Danny outside, shaking his head.

Danny continued to move to the car, unlocking it. “Alright, let’s go then,” he said, getting on the driver’s seat and waiting for Virgil to get in.

* * *

 

They got to Reuben’s place and let themselves in, moving towards the Garage. They greeted Basher and Livingston, who were tweaking with something on a screen and moved to their own assignment, which was opening a tiny compartment inside the replica of a huge vault, Toulour’s vault, to be more precise. The compartment, which according to the information they had would hold the real necklace, needed to be opened in under three minutes or an alarm would be triggered.

They had just started their first try of the day when they heard Basher from outside. “Hey mates, watch the second sequence, we updated the circuit, so if the alarm is triggered-”

While Danny stopped to listen, Virgil kept going, keeping half an ear to what Basher was saying. Unfortunately that distraction made him miss a number on the second security code, and before Basher could stop talking, the alarm was triggered. The part they weren’t expecting was the vault closing automatically before they had any chance to get out.

“- The vault will be locked until the system is restarted,” Basher finished with an annoyed sigh.

* * *

 

Steve and Kono had gone to the office to take care of the paperwork after the hostage situation from the previous day. Steve had ordered Danny to stay home and try to get some rest, and Chin and Lou were supposed to enjoy their Sunday with their significant others.

Steve was just finishing the last report when he noticed out of the corner of his eye someone coming through the main door. Kono had noticed the visitor as well, and came out of her office to welcome the newcomer.

“Mr. Ciment, what brings you here?”

Andre Ciment moved to take Kono’s hand to kiss it as he did the first time they met, but Kono just shook his hand and took some distance. “ _Madmoiselle Kal-kau-a_ , I’m so relieved I found you here! I received some information that I believe is relevant to your _investigation_ ,” he said as he passed a folder to Kono.

Steve came out of his office and greeted Ciment as well, going straight to business. “What kind of information is that?”

As Kono opened the folder and displayed its content over the computer table, Ciment explained. “I have a few contacts in the island, and when I heard the necklace was stolen, I asked those contacts for some help. They are good at providing pertinent information, and they informed me of a group of people that were previously connected to some art robberies that arrived to the island a couple of months ago. They sent some photographs, but they also said something surprising, they have met in various opportunities with a member of the governor’s task force,” he finished, pointing to a photo of Linus and Virgil sitting in what looked like a cafe. Sitting on the opposite side of the table was Danny Williams.

There were more pictures of Danny, some of him arriving at Reuben’s, others of Linus and Danny sitting in Danny’s Camaro, and one of a large group of people with Danny right in the middle of it. That last photo was the one that interested Steve the most, because he had been there, walking at Danny’s side, but on the photo his image had been altered to show Ocean talking animatedly with the shorter man. “How do you know that these are the people you claim they are?” Steve asked, sounding defensive.

Mr. Ciment produced a flash drive. “The people that provided the photographs also provided information about the people in the photos. Here’s all you need to know about them. Only a couple of them have actually been in prison for their crimes, but all of them have been suspects in more than one investigation,” he said, handing Kono the flash drive. “You understand my concerns, especially since a few of these photos have been taken in different parts in Lanai, where my property is located, as you very well know,” he said, pointing to a couple of photos of Yen and Frank and another one of Linus and Rusty sitting inside cars, seemingly waiting for something or having a shave ice.

Kono took the flash drive and plugged it into the computer, moving the photographs aside to see the files. They had information on everyone from Ocean’s crew, but for some reason, while they listed Tess Ocean as Ocean’s wife and even Linus’ mother, there was no mention of a Turk Malloy anywhere.

Kono looked unsure, glancing at Steve with a worried expression. Steve just looked furious, and had one of those faces that Danny probably had a name for. Still, she needed to do something before Ciment went to someone else with this information. “Mr. Ciment, trust me that we are just as surprised as you are by all of this. If you could give us a few minutes to discuss a course of action?” She said, motioning for Steve to follow her to his office. Once there she closed the door, knowing that it wouldn’t give them much privacy.

“Alright, let me call Chin and Lou, we have to figure out some way to get Danny out of the case without tipping him off,” she said in a not so low tone, picking up her phone and texting his cousin to get him to come into the office.

Steve stood tall with his arms crossed over his chest. “Tip him off? What are you talking about?! You know there’s no way Danny is involved in something illegal! Something must be going on, and the only way to know is by asking him!” Steve replied in a furious whisper.

Steve and Kono were still discussing how to handle the situation in not so low tones when Lou and Chin came in. They greeted Mr. Ciment, Chin invited him to wait in his office, and then the four of them tried to reach some sort of agreement. It took them about 20 minutes before Kono finally went back to talk to Ciment. “Mr. Ciment, I’m sorry for keeping you waiting. You understand this is a complicated situation for us, but our first priority is to keep the people of Hawaii safe, and uphold the Law,” she said seriously. “We are taking the information you provided and we are going to investigate it,” she continued, not liking the look on Ciment’s face. “I realize that this is an uncomfortable situation, considering that our colleague may be involved, and I would understand completely if you decided to go to the governor with this information and request your case to be assigned to someone else, but we are the best on the island, and I promise you we will do everything we can to recover what was stolen from you.”

Ciment didn’t look too sure, but seemed to believe in Kono. “Very well, but what about your colleague. How can I trust that he won’t interfere with the investigation?”

Chin was coming into the office and heard Ciment’s question. “Mr. Ciment, I understand your concern, but we take great pride in upholding the law. I can guarantee you that we will investigate this matter until we get to the bottom of it, regardless of whom may be involved.”

Ciment nodded. “Very well, I will let you continue with the investigation, but if the necklace is not recovered in a reasonable time, I will go to the Governor.”

Kono nodded as well. “We will keep you informed of any developments,” she said, suddenly hesitating. “Mr. Ciment, since some of these men were spotted near your property, maybe it would be a good idea to check that your security measures have not been compromised?”

Ciment frowned. “You think they may have done _somezing_ already?”

“We can’t know for sure, that is why we would like your permission to review your security, as well as an inventory of all the valuable pieces you currently keep there. It would be helpful if you gave us the name of the people that provided you with this information, so we can speed up the investigation and try to stop these individuals before they try anything,” Chin said.

Ciment looked at Kono’s earnest face. “You have my permission. Let me put together the information, and you can start the day after tomorrow. I want to be there to supervise this investigation.”

* * *

 

After Ciment left, Steve tried to contact Danny but only got his voicemail. Chin and he used the computer to track the Camaro’s GPS, which showed he was at Reuben’s.

Things were not exactly going as planned, but at least now they had access to Toulour’s place. They needed to find a replacement for Danny and Steve knew just the person, so he made a call, and he and Chin stopped by to pick him up on the way to Reuben’s.

Once they got there, Chin and Danny’s replacement stopped to greet Reuben and Saul, who were having drinks by the pool, while Steve moved to the Garage, hoping to find Danny and tell him about Toulour’s visit.

When he entered the Garage he found a strange scene. Livingston and Roman were arguing over some equipment while Basher was fiddling with something on the vault’s control panel and seemingly talking to it. Once Steve moved closer he could hear Virgil arguing, and it sounded like he was inside the vault. “I’m telling you I don’t know what’s wrong with him, he’s just breathing funny!”

Steve finally took in the scene in front of him: the vault was closed, Virgil was stuck inside, and since Danny was supposed to be practicing with Virgil, he was probably stuck inside the vault as well.

He rushed to the vault with a muttered curse and shoved Basher out of the way. “What the fuck happened?” He asked as he started banging on the vault. “Danny, you there?” He yelled, not hearing any answer.

* * *

 

When the door to the vault closed, Danny and Virgil stared at it for a whole minute before they finally moved. Virgil started banging the door halfheartedly. “Alright guys, ha-ha-ha, you’re so funny.” He said in a flat tone.

Danny on the other hand was pushing at the door without any luck, and when that didn’t work, he started banging at the door much harder than Virgil had been.

“Hey! Get us out of here!” He yelled as he continued to push at the door.

They could hear Basher coming closer. “You’ll have to sit tight and relax, mates. The emergency lock takes a while to disengage. It shouldn’t take more than an hour, maybe two.”

Danny started shaking his head. “Nononono, you listen to me, you gotta get us out of here, OK? You gotta open this door right now!” He said, his voice sounding shrill to his own ears.

Virgil frowned in annoyance. “Hey, what part of sit tight and relax didn’t you get? The thing is not going to open quicker because you bang on it!”

Danny pushed away from the door and started pacing, looking as if he was trying really hard not to lose it. The fact that he didn’t even acknowledged Virgil’s words made the other man worry.

“Hey, Williams, what’s going on?”

Danny moved back to the door and tried to push it again without any success, so he finally moved to the opposite wall, sliding down to sit on the floor. He lifted his hands to run them through his hair and was trying really hard to keep his breaths steady.

Virgil moved to his side, crouching to look at his face. “Hey, Danny, what’s wrong?” He asked in a gentler tone.

Danny shook his head, looking down. “I just… I can’t. I need to get out of here,” he said quietly.

Virgil frowned in concern, standing and moving back to the door. “Guys, we have a problem with Williams. I need you to hurry it up!”

They could hear some sort of discussion from outside. “What kind of problem? We can’t just smash the whole locking mechanism because he needs the loo!” They could hear Basher arguing.

Virgil rolled his eyes in annoyance. He was used to the guys not taking him seriously, but this was not the time. “I’m not joking, jackass. Something’s wrong with Williams. I need you to open the door now.”

There was silence on the other side, but after a couple of minutes they could hear Basher again. “Alright, we’re cutting the time, it should open in about ten minutes. What’s up with Williams?”

Virgil looked at the other man, who was shaking minutely on the floor and muttering something under his breath. “I don’t know he just needs to get out of here.”

“What do you mean? Is he ill, angry?” Basher asked, sounding confused.

Virgil’s patience was pretty much gone. “I’m telling you I don’t know what’s wrong with him, he’s just breathing funny!”

There was the sound of a scuffle outside and some hard banging, followed by another voice. “Danny? You there?”

When Danny didn’t reply they could hear even more banging. “Danno, can you hear me? Talk to me buddy.” The same voice repeated.

Danny lifted his head at the familiar voice. “Ste-Steve?” He asked softly, clearing his throat when it seemed like he hadn’t been loud enough. “Steve?” He tried again a little louder. “Can you get us out? I need to get out of here,” he pleaded with his partner.

Steve sighed in relief when he heard Danny, but he didn’t like the sound of him. “Just give me a minute buddy, we’ll get you out of there in no time, OK? Are you reciting the Nets lineup? What year are you at, huh?” He said loudly, as he pulled Basher by the scruff of his neck back to where Livingston and Roman were still fiddling with a screen. “I want that door open, right now,” he growled.

Livingston was sweating and trying to speak without much success and Roman had moved away, looking as if he was looking for an exit strategy, so Basher had to do the talking. “What do you think we’ve been doing, knitting a bloody jumper? We ran a program to disable the emergency lock! It should be done in a couple of minutes!”

Steve shook his head, keeping an ear in case Danny said something, but his partner was worryingly silent. “No, you listen to me, I have explosives in my car, and I will blow up that fucking door if I have to!”

Roman rolled his eyes and moved closer, standing between Steve and Basher. “Enough nonsense, if you try to blow up the door, there’s another lock-down mechanism that will seal the hinges. Your boy will be trapped there until we find someone that can make a hole on 12 inch thick steel. The program is almost done, so why don’t you keep your boy busy and we’ll take care of the door?”

Steve glared at the two men and moved closer to the vault, banging again. “Hey, Danno, how are you doing? What year are you at?”

Danny wasn’t doing too well, but it really helped to hear Steve’s voice.

“1990. Steve? I need to get out of here,” he said weakly, not moving from his position sitting on the floor. He hadn’t noticed Virgil looking at him nervously.

Steve was pressing his ear but couldn’t really hear what Danny was saying. “Hey, Danno, we’ll get you out of there really soon. Why don’t you talk to me?”

Whatever Danny replied was too soft to understand, so Virgil spoke up. “He’s just muttering to himself. I can’t even hear what he’s saying.”

Steve frowned, glancing at the other men still working on opening the vault. “Is he conscious?”

“I think so,” Virgil replied. “He’s rocking a bit.”

Before Steve could say anything else, Basher stood and moved back to the vault. “Alright, ten seconds to go.”

It was the longest ten seconds for Steve, but by the end of it they could hear the lock disengaging and they could finally pull the door open.

At the sound of the lock, Danny scrambled to his feet and moved to the door, pushing at it and squeezing out as soon as he could. He stumbled outside and he stood in the sunlight, bent in half and trying to catch his breath.

Steve followed him out, staying by his side and leading him to a nearby chair by the pool when he was ready to move. He crouched to look at Danny’s face, and not liking too much what he saw he stood up to get some water. “Stay here, Danno, OK? I’ll be right back.”

* * *

 

Danny was sitting with his eyes closed, rubbing his forehead to try to massage away a headache that was just making itself known. Once he was outside the feeling of crippling anxiety had vanished, only leaving him tired and limp. He noticed someone moving closer so he opened his eyes, assuming that it would be Steve bringing him the water he’d promised.

The newcomer wasn’t Steve though, it was Virgil, and he looked pissed.

“What the hell was that?”

Danny groaned and moved to try to sit up straighter. “Listen, I’m sorry-”

“You’re sorry?” Virgil interrupted. “You looked like you were dying in there!” He practically screamed.

Danny lifted his hands in a placating gesture and stood up. “Listen, I’m sorry I scared you. I just have a hard time with small spaces, and today I didn’t handle it so well!” Danny said loudly, so Virgil didn’t get the chance to talk over him.

Virgil shook his head. “Scared me? You were the one rolling on the floor! Yesterday you were taken hostage and today you get yourself in a vault that could get closed?” He shouted, furious.

Danny’s patience was gone, completely vanished. “You know what? I happen to be a cop, so I know a thing or two about hostage situations! And for your information, if someone had said that the thing was going to close before it actually closed, I would have thought twice before going inside!” Danny yelled. He took a deep breath when Virgil didn’t immediately yell back. “I’m sorry, OK? I put you in an uncomfortable situation. I know things are tough right now-”

“You know nothing,” Virgil bit back, regaining some steam.

Danny sighed. “I know it sucks to be away from your bro-”

Before he could finish he saw Virgil rushing at him looking furious and felt a push that made him fly a couple of feet and land roughly on his back. “Shut up! You know nothing! You can’t possibly know what it’s like to have your brother in a hospital, so shut the fuck up or I swear to God I’ll punch you in the face next time!”

Danny just stayed where he landed, trying to make sense of what just happened. Before he could even start he heard another familiar voice. “UNCLE D!!” Before a running figure appeared out of nowhere and tackled Virgil. Then followed most of Ocean’s team and Chin, trying to pull the two men apart.

Danny had a second to wonder ‘what the fuck is Eric doing here?’ before Steve’s face appeared in front of him.

“What do you say if we get you home, Danno?” He said as he took Danny’s hand to pull him to his feet.

Danny sighed, using Steve’s help to stand. “Yes, please!”

Steve led him to the Camaro and stayed by his side until he was sitting on the passenger side and then moved quickly to the driver’s. As they were driving away Danny had to ask. “What the hell is Eric doing here?”

“You’re out of the Op. He’s your replacement,” Steve said with a smile.

Danny rolled his eyes, definitely done with this day. “Of course he is.”

* * *

 

The following day, Danny found himself sleeping late on a Monday. Steve had banned him from HQ for the day. He had also explained the situation with the photos, so he didn’t have to go back to try to break into the vault from hell. The kids spent the night at Rachel’s and would only be back at his place by the evening, so there wasn’t any need to make a school run either. All this meant that Danny didn’t even worry about putting an alarm. He woke up around 11, feeling much better than the previous day, and took his time fixing himself some breakfast.

He busied himself tiding up the place, doing some laundry and putting away Charlie’s toys. By the time he was done, it wasn’t even 1 pm.

He argued with himself, telling himself that he was only going to get himself into trouble, but before he could talk himself out of it he got his keys, moved to the car and started driving towards Reuben’s.

Once he reached his destination he got out of the car, walked the short distance to the door and knocked. Dominic, Reuben’s butler was surprised to see him.

“Detective Williams, have you forgotten that Master Tishkoff provided you with a key so you could come and go at your own convenience?” He said, as he motioned for him to enter.

Danny shrugged, looking self-conscious. “Well, I wasn’t exactly sure if I was still welcome here.”

“You are always welcome here, sir. Never doubt that,” the older man said kindly.

“Thank you, buddy. And please drop the sir and the detective. I’m just Danny,” Danny said with a smile.

Patrick rolled his eyes. “I most certainly will not! Now, were you looking for master Ocean?”

Danny shook his head. “No, I wanted to talk to Virgil. Is he around?”

Dominic nodded knowingly and instructed him to follow. Once they reached the Lanai he showed him where Virgil was sitting and moved away.

Danny moved slowly to where Virgil was sitting, seemingly lost in thought. “Hey, do you mind if I sit down?” He asked, pointing at the chair next to Virgil.

Virgil looked up at him and then nodded, not very eager to make conversation.

The silence lasted for a couple of minutes, but eventually Virgil spoke. “So what are you doing here? Danny said that you were out.”

Danny nodded. “Yeah, apparently the French guy has some photos of me hanging out with you guys, so I’m supposed to stay away from the investigation. Are you working with Eric now? I apologize in advance for any and all of his lame jokes and any other stupid thing he may do.”

Virgil shook his head, looking surprised. “He’s actually great at it. Much better than you.”

“Of course he is, just don’t go trying to keep him!” Danny warned. He really didn’t want to think about Eric taking on the life of an art thief after this, so he changed the subject. “Listen, I came over to apologize for yesterday. It sucked that I put you in such a crappy situation,” he continued, growing serious.

Virgil shrugged. “It’s OK, and it’s not like we knew the thing was going to close. I overreacted I guess, and then I overreacted again, so I’m sorry too.”

Danny shook his head vehemently. “No, you were right, I butted into something that was none of my business, and you were right, I didn’t really know what I was talking about-”

“You kinda did,” Virgil interrupted. “I mean, Eric, he told me about your brother… I’m sorry man, I didn’t know,” he said sadly.

Danny’s words fled him, and he had to swallow a couple of times before he could talk again. “Listen, what do you say if we call it even? I can’t even remember what started it in the first place, and this is not an invitation for you to remind me,” he said with a small smile. “Anyways, I can imagine that it sucks to have someone you care about in a coma, so I don’t mind it if you need to vent or to take it out on someone from time to time.”

Virgil seemed lost in thought for a moment, but then he looked back at Danny. “He’s not in a coma.”

Danny frowned, fearing for a minute that this whole thing was a ruse and that they had all fallen right into it. “What do you mean he’s not in a coma?”

Virgil shrugged. “He’s not. He woke up a couple of weeks ago,” he said without much enthusiasm.

Danny smiled, glad that it was good news for a change. “That’s great, man!” He said in excitement.

Virgil shrugged again, not looking very excited. “I don’t know about that. He’s sleeping most of the time, only wakes for a couple of minutes at a time. Ma tells me that he just looks around when he’s awake and she doesn’t even know if he recognizes her,” he explains, sounding worried.

Danny frowned. “You haven’t flown in to see him?” he asked gently.

“What if he doesn’t know who I am?” Virgil replied in a small voice, shaking his head.

“Does it really matter? He’s awake, he needs his brother, man,” Danny said, reaching to put his hand on Virgil’s shoulder.

Virgil snorted. “I figured you’d say that if I told you. I’m actually flying out tonight,” he said with a small smile. “I don’t think I’m coming back, I don’t really have my head in the game right now,” he said with a self-conscious shrug.

Danny squeezed Virgil’s shoulder. “I think that’s the best decision you’ve done lately, buddy,” he said with a smile.

“Well, I’m smart like that,” Virgil said with a teasing smile.

“Right, if by smart, you mean a dope,” Danny said, lifting his hand to gently cuff Virgil on the back of the head.

Danny ended up driving Virgil to the airport, and was surprised when the other guy hugged him goodbye.


	9. Chapter 9

Eric started going to Toulour’s ranch a couple of days later. He went in for the first time with Chin and Kono, and he started the first day gathering evidence as far away from the vault as he could possibly be.

After a couple of days he was done with all of the windows and doors, and it was time to move to where the valuables were kept.

Basher and Roman had said that they were impressed with how quickly he’d learned to break into the vault without triggering the alarm, but he still was worried about messing up and ruining the whole operation.

Mr. Ciment had provided Kono with a list of all the pieces he supposedly kept in his vault. There was a number of jewels, a couple of old artifacts, three oil canvases and some sort of sword. The list did mention the necklace, but placed it on a compartment in the opposite side from where their intel said the real necklace was.

Ciment unlocked the vault, disabled the alarms, and left Eric by himself collecting the evidence. Eric wasn’t surprised at the supposed freedom he had been allowed inside the vault, because he knew there were a couple of cameras filming him and all sort of security measures going in and out of the house. Every compartment had an individual code, so Eric didn’t really have access to the contents of the vault.

Eric crouched to go through the contents of his bag, lifting his hand to scratch his ear and activate the comm that connected him to whoever was managing the video feed at Reuben’s place. “Okay, I’m ready to go,” he muttered, seemingly talking to himself. He made some time putting on his gloves and taking out some supplies from his kit, and waited for the signal to proceed.

Damn, he really hoped he wouldn’t screw this up.

* * *

 

Back at Reuben’s, Livingston and Roman were sitting in front of a huge computer. At Eric’s confirmation, Livingston typed some commands and tapped into the surveillance videos of the vault. They had in file a couple of videos of Eric while he practiced at Reuben’s, and were feeding that footage to the surveillance tapes. Every few seconds he would look at Roman, as if checking that he wasn’t messing with his equipment.  Once they were ready, they gave Eric the go-ahead.

Ocean and Rusty were standing a few feet away with drinks on their hands, watching as the operation took place.

* * *

 

The surveillance station received a prerecorded video of Eric dutifully gathering evidence from the vault. In reality, once he’d gotten the instruction, Eric had moved quickly to the right compartment and started entering the first of 3 codes that needed to be used in order to open that particular box.

According to the Intel they had, the codes needed to be inserted in less than three minutes before the alarm went off.

Eric was starting on the third one with more than a minute to spare when all of a sudden the alarms started ringing. He looked around in desperation, watching as the door to the vault started closing. He didn’t even have the necklace and now he would be stuck in here before he could get it and the whole thing would be ruined.

Before the door completely closed, someone shoved what looked like an antique iron chest in the opening, making it impossible for the door to close.

* * *

 

Back at Reuben’s, Livingston had started going through the prerecorded footage looking for some shots that showed Eric looking around in surprise or waiting for the alarm to stop, but for some reason he couldn’t make it look believable, which made him fumble even more.

Roman took over the keyboard with a muttered curse, quickly putting together some images that looked like what they needed. He also blended in the image of the chest stuck in the door in the far right corner of the image. He put up a short video combining these images, uploading it to the house surveillance system.

* * *

 

Back at the vault, Toulour’s maid, Kala poked her head in. “Hey, did you get it?” She asked hurriedly.

Eric blinked in confusion. “What? I didn’t- the alarm went off, I wasn’t doing anything!” He said defensively.

Kala squeezed in, moving to his side. “Keep going!” she said sharply, as she instructed Makani, another maid standing outside, to keep watch. “I think Toulour cut the time to put the codes, so that’s what triggered the alarm,” she explained.

Eric turned back to the panel, looking over his shoulder at Kani every few seconds, just to make sure that she wasn’t going to alert anyone. He fumbled a bit to enter the last code, but finally the compartment was open.

He looked at the beautiful necklace in awe, at first a bit afraid of taking it. Kala nudged him to get moving, so he carefully took the necklace and replaced it with the cheap replica he had brought with him.

All that was left to do was placing the necklace in the hidden compartment inside his kit, but it was just Eric’s luck that the zipper got stuck. He cursed, pulling at the thing, but it wouldn’t budge. He was starting to freak out and his head helpfully conjured up terrible images of a life in prison and him wearing those orange jumpsuits, which wasn’t really helping his nerves.

He cursed even more when Makani rushed to tell them that someone was coming. He was moving things around his kit, trying to find some place to hide the necklace when Kali just took the necklace from his hands with an annoyed huff, shoving it under her bosom. Since the uniform the maids wore was not tight, they couldn’t really notice anything sticking out up there. “Don’t worry, brah, I’ll get this to Reuben’s later,” she said with a wink as she jumped out of the vault. Eric just gaped at her, not sure if he had been screwed over or if she was really helping him.

* * *

 

When Livingston and Roman saw that the situation was under control and that the necklace was safely out of sight, they cut the connection so the real time video was back on. Livingston cleaned his sweaty hands on his slacks, while Roman stepped outside for a smoke.

Ocean and Rusty breathed a sigh of relief, moving away.

“Wanna head to the beach?” asked Rusty.

“No, thanks, gotta call the Mrs.” Replied Ocean.

* * *

 

Back at the house, Kali had gotten out of the vault, and as soon as she was out, her demeanor transformed completely, her eyes filled with tears and she was wringing a cleaning rag between her hands. “Please sir, stay there! I don’t know if this door will close, I don’t want you to get hurt! I’m so sorry!” She cried in distress. Eric just gaped at her, not really following.

She turned to look away from the door. “Mr. Ciment! I don’t know what happened! I was cleaning as always and this thing started going lolo!”

Andre Ciment (or Francoise Toulour, as Eric was trying really hard not to call him) appeared at the opening, taking in the sight of the iron chest keeping the vault from closing, the alarm still going off and Eric looking pretty much like a fish out of the water.

Ciment moved to the control panel, pressing a few buttons on the vault that made the door open and release the chest. Kala pulled the chest back to its original position, dusting it and looking upset at some dents that she could find.

Ciment moved inside the vault, studying Eric. “My apologies for this unfortunate incident, are you well?”

Eric blinked in surprise. He had been at the defense, expecting some sort of accusation, so he was caught off ward by Ciment’s question. He took a deep breath and nodded, lifting his forearm to scratch his forehead. “I’m good. Just got a bit spooked by all the noise and the door closing,” he replied with a shrug.

Ciment nodded. “I trust that it didn’t interfere with your work. Have you found anything?”

“I found some fingerprints and some traces of hair. I’ll have to get them back to the lab so we can get an ID,” Eric replied, nodding towards his kit. “I still have about half of it to go. It shouldn’t take me more than an hour,” he continued. “I believe that you already had some samples taken for elimination?”

“Yes, _Madmoiselle Kal-kau-a_ took some fingerprints and other samples,” Ciment replied with a nod. He kept looking at Eric’s kit with mistrust.

“Is there something the matter?” Asked Eric, trying not to look too worried.

“Well, the alarm was triggered while you were inside the vault. You understand that I have good reason to be suspicious about your person,” Ciment said, not beating around the bush.

Eric lifted his eyebrows, looking around the vault. “Everything was closed while I was in here,” he said, lifting a gloved finger to poke at a random drawer to prove his point.

“I mean,” he continued, “I get that it’s totally weird that the alarm went crazy while I was stuck in here, but I work with the Honolulu Crime Lab, they’d be terribly stupid to hire someone with sticky fingers,” he said, wiggling his fingers for emphasis.

Ciment nodded, not looking too sure.

Eric seemed to consider what to do for a moment and finally came to a decision. “You know, I’d be happy to let you go through my stuff personally if it would make you feel better. The thing is, I can’t really do it, ‘cause that would be tampering with evidence, and that’s a criminal offense. I could maybe go through my stuff while you look? If you’re really worried, that is,” he said, picking up his kit and moving out of the vault, in search of some table to place it.

Ciment stopped him, lifting his hands. “No, _Monsieur Rousseau_ , there’s no need. Continue with your work, _s’il vous plait_. My apologies for the interruption,” he said, finally moving out of the room.

Eric waited until Ciment was out of the room to mutter under his breath. “It’s Russo!” He finished gathering his evidence, packed up his stuff and after saying goodbye to Toulor, he left, getting into his car and driving away, finally able to breathe.  Once he was a few blocks away, he pulled over to the curve and took a minute to run his hands over his face, laughing nervously. He finally took out his phone and dialed Danny’s number. “Hey, Uncle D. Yeah, it’s done. I just don’t know if we did it or if someone else took the thing.”

He could hear Danny’s sigh from the other side of the line. “Well, that’s just great,” he replied.

* * *

 

Toulour waited until Eric left to go check the security control room, where two guards were in charge of checking the security footage.

“Gentlemen, I want to see the _sécurité_ footage for the time the alarm went off,” he asked.

The guards pulled up the security footage for the three cameras, showing Eric gathering some evidence and suddenly looking up in surprise.  He looked away to see the chest being shoved in the door and stood there, looking outside and seeming nervous. Finally the alarm was turned off and Ciment himself appeared in the footage, talking to the evidence technician.

“Was there any technical issues while the alarm was triggered?” Ciment asked.

Both guards shook their heads, looking at each other. “There was nothing strange going on, Mr. Ciment, we were watching the whole time.” One of them replied.

Ciment nodded, moving to the door. “Very well, good work, you have my thanks.”

They waited for Ciment to be out of earshot before one of them picked up his phone. “Hey cuz’ we’re good. Yeah, the haole did good, and Kala has it. Okay, talk soon. Aloha.”


	10. Chapter 10

Andre Ciment had been called by Commander McGarrett for a meeting at the Museum. He was expecting some sort of report on how the investigation was going, or maybe some stupid explanation about how they had no leads, so they would have to file the investigation and he’d have to settle the situation directly with the museum.

He wasn’t expecting to find Commander McGarrett, Detective Williams, the director of the Museum and the curator, along with a man he didn’t recognize.

“Mr. Ciment, thank you for coming in such short notice,” Steve started. “Let me introduce you to Detective Daniel Williams, part of my team, and SAC Robert Caldwell, FBI.”

Ciment moved to greet the two men, as well as Granger and Tupuola. “FBI? Have you found the people that stole my necklace?” He asked taking a seat on the conference table.

Caldwell cleared his throat. “I’m afraid I am responsible for the theft of your necklace.”

Before the FBI agent could continue, detective Williams interjected. “Actually, it’s sort of both of our faults,” he said, standing up to pace around the room. “You see, the Governor was recently contacted by the FBI. The White Collar division was investigating a number of museums that were thought as being targeted by an international art thief,” he explained.

“As a part of their investigation a team of… professionals would test the security of the museum, and report back about any weaknesses that they found. Unfortunately, that meant they had to try to actually steal something, and they were not aware that your necklace was not a part of the permanent collection of the museum,” Danny finished with a shrug, turning to Caldwell so he could continue the explanation.

Caldwell nodded, continuing the tale. “Once the test was complete, the team needed to compile all the weaknesses they found in the museum and report it to our superiors. It took some time to complete the procedure, and only recently we contacted the museum to return the piece and inform them of our findings.”

“Wait, I have trouble understanding. Some FBI agents stole my necklace?” Ciment interrupted, looking as if his patience was running thin.

Danny winced, but Caldwell was the one to reply. “Not exactly sir, the professionals Detective Williams was talking about are led by a CI, he was once convicted for art theft, and we contacted him and his team for their expertise.”

Ciment blinked rapidly, shaking his head in disbelief. “You allowed some thieves to take my necklace? How do I know that it wasn’t damaged? And more importantly, where is it?” He asked in a sharp tone.

Raymond Granger, the president of the museum’s board of directors, stood up, bringing a jewel case. “M-monsieur Ciment, Agent Caldwell brought the necklace and Ms. Tupuola just finished checking it. It is exactly the same piece that you brought, she checked the markings on the diamonds and the placement of the jewels, we are certain that it is the same piece and that it was undamaged,” he explained, passing the box to Ciment.

Ciment didn’t look happy, but he took the box and checked the necklace. Caldwell took the pause as a chance to continue explaining. “The necklace was given to us on the same day that it was taken from the museum, it was kept in a special vault and stored with the highest care to avoid any damage,” he reassured.

Ailani, the curator, produced a folder with images from the diamonds. “Mr. Ciment, as Mr. Granger explained, I examined the piece in detail and compared it to the images we had on file,” she started, presenting two images of the necklace at a very large scale. “As you can see, the largest stone had a small imperfection, known as a pinpoint, near the corner,” she demonstrated, pointing at a small lighter spot in one of the images, and then taking out a large magnifying glass so Ciment could look at the necklace. “You can see the imperfection right there. This kind of mark cannot be duplicated, and there’s more like that one that we found in our first examination and that prove that this is the same necklace. We also checked if any damage had been done to the piece, and I am very pleased to tell you that it is in perfect state,” she reassured with a smile.

Ciment looked closely at the necklace with the magnifying glass and seemed a little less irritated. He moved away and turned to Mr. Granger. “I assume this means that I can take my necklace?”

Granger nodded nervously. “Of course! The reason behind this meeting was to explain the situation and to return the necklace to you. Also, to give you our most sincere apologies!”

Ciment nodded, taking the box with the necklace and standing up. “Very well. I thank you for returning the necklace,” he said tightly as he moved towards the door. Before going out, he turned to Steve. “Commander McGarrett, may I have a word with you?” He said as he stepped out of the room.

* * *

 

Both Steve and Danny followed him out of the conference room. Once they were out, Ciment rounded on Steve. “I need to know if you were aware of this… operation, were you just indulging me when you brought all of those people into my home?”

Before Steve could reply, Danny interrupted. “Mr. Ciment, as I told you in there, the governor asked me to work with this FBI team. She also requested that we didn’t disclose the details to anyone. She wanted to take the chance to evaluate the procedures of the Honolulu Police Department and even of the Five-0 taskforce, so we kept quiet about it. From what we could see, both HPD and Five-0 followed the appropriate procedure under the circumstances, and every action they took was meant to preserve the safety of you and your belongings,” he said, trying to reassure the other man.

Ciment nodded, but still didn’t look too certain. “There was also the matter of those men surveying my property,” he said in way of a question.

Danny cleared his throat, seemingly embarrassed. “Well, Steve showed me those images this morning. Those guys are actually part of the team in charge of the work at the museum,” he said with a shrug.

“So they were planning to rob me, as I feared?” Ciment said.

Danny chuckled, shaking his head. “Not really. There’s a place in Lanai that they wanted to visit, they got a bit lost, and by the time they got their bearings the place was already closed, so they had to spend the night there. I believe whoever took those photos caught them while they were trying to find the place,” Danny explained, sounding amused.

Ciment shook his head, looking indignant. “That is a preposterous explanation! What sort of thing could they be doing in Lanai that they couldn’t do in any other island? And just a few miles away from my property?”

Danny sighed, moving to take out his phone. “Honestly? I don’t understand it myself, but there’s this sanctuary where they all really wanted to go,” he said, finding the images he was looking for and showing them to Ciment.

There were photos of Yen and Frank literally covered in cats of all colors and sizes, another one of Linus petting a small tabby kitten and one of Rusty sharing a piece of his sandwich with a fluffy cat with one clipped ear. “One of them was even thinking on taking a couple of the little ones home, he’s just trying to figure out if the agriculture people have any restrictions,” he explained. “And believe it or not, this place is just a few miles away from your ranch, so if you’re a cat person, you should definitely check it out,” Danny finished with a smile.

Ciment looked at both men, realizing that he had nothing to argue about the explanation they had provided. “Thank you, detective Williams, but I have to decline. This has been a very unpleasant experience, so I will return home. Thank you for your help, even if no help was needed after all. Have a good day,” he said, moving towards the door.

They both waited until Ciment had gotten inside the car and driven away before Steve spoke. “Did they really like the cat sanctuary?”

Danny chuckled, shaking his head. “Frank hated it with a vengeance! He still complains that he has cat hair stuck in his throat, Yen loved it, or at least Linus said he did, and Linus wants to adopt a couple, one for him and one for his Ma. We’ll just have to see what Agent Caldwell thinks about it!” He said with a chuckle as they moved back to the conference room. “Rusty just put up with it, but he found a nice shrimp truck just near the exit, so he wasn’t too bummed.”

Steve laughed, as he followed Danny inside. “Don’t let Ailani’s cousin hear about that, or he’ll send Flippa to case the place!” Steve warned, shaking his head in amusement.

Danny rolled his eyes. “I’m pretty sure that our intrepid investigators already told her about it. By the way, who would have thought that the Kapu were so good at photoshop,” he said with a chuckle as they joined the rest of the group.

They were relieved that one of the last parts of the plan had gone without a hitch, now they only had to call Benedict and finish this charade.


	11. Chapter 11

A few days later, Danny was anxiously waiting for Benedict to show up. The team had decided that Danny was the right person to meet Benedict and return the necklace, and Danny, for some reason he couldn’t understand right then, had agreed.

He had also agreed to meet Benedict at HQ, and now doubted that decision. It was a Sunday morning and they had finished a case the previous Friday, so there was no reason for anyone to come into the office. Danny’s kids were with Rachel for the weekend, so he was free to have the meeting with Benedict and finally get that necklace back to where it belonged, but Danny was nervous. Danny had virtually counted the ways in which things could go wrong, and he didn’t like any of those many scenarios, someone could interrupt them, or Benedict could decide not to show up, Danny was giving himself an ulcer just thinking about it.

He had arrived at the office an hour in advance of the meeting, bringing the necklace with him. He had taken the time to finish up a couple of reports and sign some documents Kono and Jerry had left for him, but now it was 15 minutes before the agreed time and Danny couldn’t seem to sit still. He looked at the jewelry box sitting on his desk, having trouble believing that he had a piece of Hawaiian history in his office, much less that he was about to hand it back to a man that had gotten it through mostly illegal sources in the first place.

Ocean’s team had asked Ailani to check the necklace on the down-low, and just by the look on her face you could tell it was definitely the original jewel even before she confirmed the good news.  Terry Benedict had kept an invaluable piece of history to himself, and they were sure it wasn’t the only valuable piece he had. It made Danny’s hackles rise, and made him wish they could find some legitimate reason to investigate him and take away all the pieces that belonged in a museum, not in the hands of some sick art hoarder.

Danny shook himself, checking his watch again and realizing that it was only 5 minutes before the agreed time. He looked at his desk to check that the necklace was still where he had left it and then turned around to check the main door again, just in case. He wasn’t expecting to find Terry Benedict standing at the doorway, looking at him with his usual annoying grin.

Benedict entered HQ alone, to Danny’s relief, looking around as if checking that they were by themselves. “Good morning, Mr. Malloy, or should I call you detective Williams now?” He asked with a smirk.

Danny grabbed the box with the necklace and a folder with some photos and papers and moved closer to Benedict, ignoring his greeting. “Follow me, please. I just want to get this over with, and I couldn’t get all of the CCTV in here to shut down.” He said in a tight voice, moving to the main doors and motioning for Benedict to follow him.

They moved down the hallway to a door that led to the emergency stairs. Danny entered first, waiting for Benedict to come in before he let the door close. He fidgeted with the jewelry box for a bit before he finally just handed it over. “Here it is. I hope this will get you to leave us alone,” he muttered.

Benedict took the box with care, opening it gently and checking the jewel inside. “I trust that this is the original and you are not stupid enough to try to give me a replica,” he stated in a serious tone.

Danny rolled his eyes. “It’s the original. We asked someone who knows about this kind of thing to check it out. It’s the real deal,” he said, presenting the folder to Benedict, intending to show him the corresponding documents.

Benedict shook his head, closing the box and placing it under his arm. “If it’s the real thing, we are done. It’s been surprisingly pleasant doing business with you, Mr. Malloy. But you’ll understand if I choose to cut our business relationship short,” he said, as he moved back to the door that led to the main floor. He pulled at the handle, but the door wouldn’t budge. He tried again, but the door still wouldn’t open, so he turned to glare at Danny.

Danny moved to Benedict’s side, trying the door himself, but it looked like it had been locked from the other side when they had come out to the stairs. “Damn, I keep forgetting that this thing locks itself,” he muttered under his breath, looking in his pockets for the access card that would unlock the door. He looked on his front pockets, and then on his back pockets, but he knew he wouldn’t find anything. “It looks like I left the card in my office, so we are pretty much locked out. We’ll have to go downstairs and get in through the lobby. That door is always open,” he shrugged it off.

Benedict tensed, glaring at Danny. “Mr. Malloy, if this is some sort of trap and something happens where this necklace is stolen from me, I will make you personally responsible for it, are we clear?” He threatened, moving closer to seem more intimidating.

Danny just chuckled in Benedict’s face. “Seriously? We are inside a State building, on the floor where the Governor’s task force has its headquarters. We are smack in the middle of every government and law enforcement agency in the island and you think we are going to somehow orchestrate the robbery of that stupid necklace?” He answered, his tone moving from incredulity to serious irritation. “The only thing I was planning for today was to get you away from our lives, hopefully forever,” he bit out, nudging him not too gently to get him to take a step back and move down the stairs.

They moved downstairs, Benedict at a quick pace, and Danny following a bit more slowly and finally reached the door that led to the ground floor. Danny moved to open it and step outside, but Benedict stopped him. “Wait, I’d like to go first, if you don’t mind. I wouldn’t want to give you the chance to signal anyone that could be waiting,” he said with a smirk, just to rile up Danny even further.

Danny just took a deep breath and opened the door for Benedict, allowing him to go first. The lobby was pretty much deserted, except for the couple of guards that were watching a game on the reception when Benedict first came in and that now seemed to be standing at attention and the middle aged Asian woman that started walking in Benedict’s direction as soon as he stepped outside. “Oh, Mr. Benedict! I’m so glad that you decided to come!” She said in excitement, reaching to shake his hand.

Benedict shook the woman’s hand, turning to glare at Danny. “Excuse me, I believe we haven’t been introduced,” he said in a neutral tone, not liking the smirk he found on Danny’s face.

Danny stepped closer, patting Benedict’s back as if they were old friends. “Oh, Mr. Benedict, this is Governor Keiko Mahoe. I know this is unusual, but after she heard about the news, she asked to be present when you brought the necklace,” he said with a shrug, looking far too pleased about himself.

Mahoe seemed to be itching to take the jewelry box she could see peeking from under Benedict’s arm, but she was barely restraining herself. “You’ll have to forgive me, Mr. Benedict, but after having that beautiful replica of the necklace stolen, and all the bad publicity that it carried, we never thought that a Good Samaritan as yourself would go out of his way to reach out to us and return this wonderful piece of Hawaiian history!” She gushed.

Benedict glared at Danny, but turned back to smile at the Governor. “Well, it was the least I could do when I saw the news, I just couldn’t in good conscience keep to myself such a valuable piece for the people of Hawaii! I just didn’t want to give you any false hopes in case it was not the original,” he said, trying to find some way to get out of the situation.

Mahoe nodded, turning to look at Danny. “Oh, absolutely! That is why you asked detective Williams to take the necklace and have it checked, right?”

Danny nodded with a happy smile. “That is correct! And as I told you over the phone this morning and I just relayed to Mr. Benedict, the curator at the Bishop Museum informed us that the necklace Mr. Benedict brought was indeed the original necklace of Queen Liliʻuokalani'!” He exclaimed, patting Benedict’s back again. “I was also telling him that we looked over _all the information_ he provided related to how he acquired the piece, and I was happy to find that there weren’t any illegal transactions. It was just a matter of a number of collectors not knowing what they really had in their hands,” he reported with a smile.

Mahoe beamed at the news. “I am so glad to hear that, and so grateful for your decision to donate the piece back to its rightful owners,” she said, turning to look at Benedict and at the jewel case still under his arm.

Danny lifted his hand to squeeze Benedict’s shoulder. “Yes, we have nothing but gratitude for Mr. Benedict’s actions. Did you know, governor Mahoe, that he even provided us with information for _all the art purchases_ he has made in the last few years? He wanted to make sure that nothing like what had happened with the Queen’s necklace had happened with another of the beautiful pieces he has collected over the years, so we took the time to go over _every piece of information_ , and could assert if there was anything at all illegal in those purchases,” he said, shaking Benedict a bit in what looked like a friendly gesture. “He’s truly a remarkable man!”

Mahoe nodded, still smiling and continued to look at Benedict. “Oh, he is indeed!” She said with a pleased smile, her expression turned more serious when she saw no move from Benedict to release the jewel case. “I understand that it is quite difficult to part with such a beautiful piece. Detective Williams mentioned that you wished to keep your donation private, but if you changed your mind, maybe we could arrange an official ceremony for you to make your donation and announce that the Queen’s necklace has been returned to the people of Hawaii,” she suggested.

The hand on Benedict’s shoulder suddenly pinched some sort of nerve and he had to fake a cough before he reached for the jewel case and presented it to the Governor. “That won’t be necessary. I am a very private person, so I would hate for you to waste your time and the State’s money in such ceremony. I am only happy to know that this beautiful piece has found its rightful owner once again,” he said with a pleasant, if fake smile.

The Governor took the jewel case, opening it and barely restraining herself from making some undignified noise in delight. She closed the case and reached out to shake Benedict’s hand again. “You have no idea how much this means to the people of Hawaii. We’ll be eternally grateful for your gesture.”

Benedict shook Mahoe’s hand and finally got released from Danny’s grip on his shoulder. Unfortunately, he got a hold of his hand instead. “Yes, we will be forever grateful for his generosity to our people,” Danny said, painfully squeezing his hand. He reached for the folder he’d been carrying and passed it to Benedict. “And before I forget, here is all the information you provided about the necklace and everything else. Thank you, it was really helpful to our investigation,” he said with a dangerous glint in his eye. Inside the folder was a summary of all the evidence they had found of every illegal thing Benedict had pulled in the last 15 years, all thoroughly documented and ready to be sent to a number of law enforcement agencies if the need arose.

Benedict took the folder and stepped away from Danny, shaking his hand a bit to return the feeling to it and turning to give the Governor a tight smile. “It has been my pleasure to make a contribution to the people of Hawaii. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a flight to catch in just a few hours, so I’d better be going. Goodbye,” he said, nodding at Danny in defeat. Then he turned around and left.

Before he could leave, four people appeared in the lobby. “Oh, Mr. Benedict! I’m so glad we caught you!” Steve exclaimed happily.

Kono moved closer, reaching to shake his hand. “Mr. Benedict, I’m Officer Kono Kalakaua, and these are Lt. Commander Steve McGarrett, Captain Lou Grover and Lieutenant Chin Ho Kelly, Five-0. We didn’t want to miss the opportunity to thank you for your donation,” she said with a happy smile.

Lou moved closer in order to shake Benedict’s hand as well. “I believe that two gentlemen came with you and were waiting for you in the Lobby. Unfortunately, since the Governor and her security team were coming, we had to kindly ask them to wait outside. They tried to call you to let you know, but for some reason the call didn’t go through,” he said, nodding in the direction of the door.

Danny came closer, joining the group. “Oh, the janitor was cleaning the elevator just as we were about to come down here to meet with the Governor, so we took the stairs. I guess it’s true what they say that the stairway has terrible cell phone reception!”

Benedict’s act dropped, and with a final glare to everyone he stepped out of the palace, got inside his car and drove away.

The governor was far too excited with the necklace to notice any of this, or how Danny deflated once Benedict left. The rest of the Five-0 team were talking animatedly with the Governor, looking at the necklace and generally in a great mood. It took Danny a few minutes to share in the joy, but finally he could breathe easy. Benedict would leave them be if he wasn’t completely stupid, and if he was, they could take him down, and he would enjoy it immensely. They were done, and were free to finally move on with their crazy lives.


	12. Chapter 12

Once the op was done, everyone went their separate ways. They had lives to go back to, and in some cases, crazy terrorist plots to stop.

It took them about a month before they could all go back to Hawaii and plan some sort of get-together.

Steve invited everyone for a barbecue at his place (Kono suggested a poker night, but everyone else thought it was a terrible idea) since everyone at Five-0 felt a bit more comfortable in a familiar environment.

For Danny it felt pretty much like any other beach day at Steve’s, only with a lot more people than usual. Ocean and Rusty had brought their wives, and while Tess was reading a book by the shade of the palm trees, Isabel was talking animatedly with Chin and Kono about this complicated case she had back in Europol. They were not entirely convinced when she finished the story by saying the thief was never captured, or the loving look she threw her husband when she was done.

Danny would have stayed and listened to Isabel’s story, but he couldn’t help but notice that Rusty and Ocean were sitting at the Lanai with Grace and Will, and that they had a deck of cards on the table. “Hey! I’ll be personally collecting every cent you take from my daughter, we clear?” He threatened, not entirely joking.

Rusty almost choked on the burger he was eating, while Ocean just chuckled. “Don’t worry, Williams, you’ve taught her surprisingly well,” he said.

Danny’s serious expression was completely ruined, but he still tried to keep the act. “Okay, then don’t take Will’s money or Lou will be taking it back from you.”

Ocean just rolled his eyes. “Duly noted.”

Linus’ parents were sitting on the wooden chairs, looking in amusement as Linus and Yen tried to balance on some surfboards that they borrowed from Steve. Kono had tried to explain to them that they wouldn’t get any decent waves at this time of the day, but there was no convincing them, and they were spending more time in the water than on the boards, so it didn’t make much of a difference.

Lou and Renee were at the grill, while Frank gave them tips on how to get the perfect color on the burgers. Livingston was looking from a corner, but soon enough he was pulled into building some sort of sand fortress with Charlie and Eric. Abby and Sara joined them later, and soon enough it turned into some sort of water and sand battle (Eric started it, of course).

Kamekona and Flippa arrived a bit later, bringing shrimp and a portable shave ice machine. Mamo came in a few minutes later, bringing his nieces, Kala and Makani with him. He sat down on a corner of the Lanai, where Reuben and Saul were smoking cigars and enjoying the shade while the girls moved to the water.

Roman had been trying to hit on Kono until Adam arrived, and then went off to help Samantha and Ailani with the drinks and salads. He didn’t miss the fact that Lou was watching his every move. Basher followed to help, and to keep an eye on Roman himself.

Danny had been looking for Steve for a while, but between greeting the people that arrived and keeping an eye on Grace and Charlie, he hadn’t really seen where his partner had gone off to. He was about to go look for him inside when he came from the side of the house. “Hey Danny, someone’s asking for you outside,” he said, pointing in the direction of the front of the house.

Danny frowned, looking around to check what he already knew, everyone that could make it to Hawaii was currently on Steve’s backyard. He moved towards the front of the house, dreading that some unpleasant surprise awaited him there.

There was a black van parked at the end of Steve’s driveway and someone was getting out of the back seat. Danny’s expression went from wary to a happy smile when he saw the man coming out of the van. “Virg Malloy! You made it!” He said happily, moving closer to hug the newcomer.

“Well, yeah! Free food and booze? I’m in!” Virgil said, returning the hug. He pulled away at the sound of another voice.

“Virg? What the hell is that? Are you a virgin all of a sudden? Does your wife know?” Came a snarky voice from inside the car. “And by the way, what does a guy have to do to get some help outta the car, huh? Do you want me to do a Daniel Day Lewis impression or what?”

Virgil just rolled his eyes and moved back to the van. “Alright, alright, I’m coming, Gimpy, don’t get your panties in a twist!”

Danny watched as Virgil helped his brother out of the car, the two brothers bickering nonstop. He was glad to see that while Turk needed a cane to move around, he was mostly able to stand on his two feet. He could see a bit of the resemblance everyone talked about, but the guy was about 15 pounds thinner, had a ridiculous goatee and the hair at the sides of his head really short, almost like a Mohawk.

The brothers turned back to look at Danny, and Turk limped closer. “So you’re the one that’s supposed to look like my long lost twin?” He asked, looking at Danny up and down. “I don’t see it. You dress like an old man, and the hair?” he said, shaking his head.

Danny just rolled his eyes and started moving back to the backyard, motioning for them to follow. “This coming from a guy with a Mohawk? Were you under the impression that you woke up in the nineties?” He asked.

His comeback was met by silence, followed by a quiet “They shaved my hair off for surgery, okay?”

Danny sucked in his breath, turning around quickly, an apology at the ready, but saw both Turk and Virgil smirking. They burst into sniggers at Danny’s expression.

“You’re right, he’s an asshole. I like him,” Turk said with a smile, as they slowly moved into the backyard, shaking off Virgil’s support when everyone in Ocean’s team came over to greet them.

* * *

 

A couple of hours later, the food was gone and everyone was mostly relaxing when Steve started clinking his beer bottle. “Hey listen. I just wanted to say something, not only on behalf of my team, but of the people of Hawaii as well. Unfortunately under the circumstances, we can’t exactly give you guys a medal or anything like that, but you have helped us to return a piece of Hawaiian history back to where it belongs, and I want to thank you for that, from the bottom of our hearts. _Mahalo nui loa_ ,” he said, raising his beer bottle.

“ _Mahalo nui loa_ ,” echoed all the native Hawaiians as they toasted.

Once the toast was done, Linus wondered. “Okay, so this was a pretty huge operation. What do you guys think we should call ourselves now?”

Turk looked around the room with his teasing smile. “Well, Ocean’s 347 doesn’t exactly have a nice ring to it…”

Kono interjected between everyone’s chuckles. “No, brah, we should just call it Ohana,” she said with a smile.

Everyone seemed to like the idea, so with a shrug, Turk lifted his fruit smoothie ( _fucking meds, he was dying for a beer!_ ). “Alright then, to Ohana.”

“To Ohana!” Everyone said, raising their drinks.

* * *

 

 

**THE END**

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so happy to finally post this story, and I'd love to see what you think about it!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [To Steal From A Thief Title Card](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11659722) by [Brumeier](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brumeier/pseuds/Brumeier)




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